A 



/ft 




o ' 



4r < 



ft ■* V- > ° ff\ 



,0 o . 



^ v 



#K -.1 




•0' s 



4> 



5» - ^ 



-C j, ' <J X 



\ . N 



■fop 

II, ~ ^si™ 



o 



THE LURE OF 
THE MEDITERRANEAN 




The Ship Dwe Hers: A Story 
of a Happy Cruise 



ALBERT BIGELOW PAINE 



Author of 
"from van dweller to commuter" 
"the tent dwellers" etc. 



With Illustrations from Drawings 
by THOMAS FOGARTY 
and from Photographs 





BY 




HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 

NEW YORK AND LONDON 



A& 1 



Copyright, 1910, 1921, by Harper & Brothers 



Alt rights reserved 
Printed in the United States of America 



mar -5 1921 

§>C!.A6il009 

-TV. . t 



TO 

MARK TWAI N 

HERO OF MY CHILDHOOD 
INSPIRATION OF MY YOUTH 
FRIEND OF THESE LATER YEARS 



FOREWORD 



To cross the Southern Atlantic and enter the Gibral- 
tar Gates, to drift over a sea of dreams to Greece, to 
climb the Acropolis and wander through the ruined 
Parthenon, to sail at sunset on the Golden Horn, to 
ascend the Nile to Thebes and make the acquaintance 
of Amenophis II in the still Valley of the Kings — this, 
to most of us, means travel. 

Once, a long time ago — it was in 1867 — the good 
ship Quaker City carried the first little band of ocean 
excursionists to the shores of the Mediterranean, and 
one of them wrote a book about it that made those 
early "pilgrims" immortal. How many ships have 
followed the little side-wheeler, getting always bigger 
until, all at once, they ceased going — forever, ap- 
parently — for the war had come and brought ruin to 
the world. 

Now, once more, the big ships are starting; the old 
lure of the old places stirs the old-time tugging in the 
heart ; the Mediterranean shores will soon be populous 
again with our romantic, travel-loving race. The call 
of the East never fails of answer. 

For those who dream of going, some day; for those 
who are happily going now; even for those who have 
been and returned, this story of one favored ship and 
its fortunate company was written. It does not pre- 
tend to tell everything — not even the guide-books can 
do that — it is just a reflection of people and places, and 
days of the golden East. It was written in happiness 
— it is offered in humility. 

A. B. P. 



CONTENTS 



CHAP. PAGE 

I The Book, and the Dream i 

II In the Track of the Innocents 9 

III Days at Sea 16 

IV We Become History 23 

V Introducing the Reprobates 26 

VI A Land of Heart's Desire 29 

VII A Day to Ourselves 41 

VIII Out of the Sunrise 46 

IX Early Mediterranean Experiences 57 

X The Diverting Story of Algiers 62 

XI We Enter the Orient . 68 

XII We Touch at Genoa 86 

XIII Malta, a Land of Yesterday 95 

XIV A Sunday at Sea 113 

XV A Port of Missing Dreams 118 

XVI Athens that Is 139 

XVII Into the Dardanelles 146 

XVIII A City of Illusion .150 

XIX The Turk and Some of His Phases . . . . 158 

XX Abdul Hamid Goes to Prayer 172 

XXI Looking Down on Yildiz 182 

XXII Ephesus: the City that Was '. . 191 

XXIII Into Syria 208 

XXIV The House that Cain Built 214 

XXV Going Down to Damascus 222 

XXVI The "Pearl of the East" 226 

v 



Contents 



CHAP. PAGE 

XXVII Footprints of Paul 239 

XXVIII Discontented Pilgrims 247 

XXIX Damascus, the Garden Beautiful . . . . 255 

XXX Where Pilgrims Gather In 263 

XXXI The Holy City 274 

XXXII The Holy Sepulchre 278 

XXXIII Two Holy Mountains 288 

XXXIV The Little Town of the Manger .... 297 

XXXV The Sorrow of the Chosen — The Way of the 

Cross 301 

XXXVI At the Mouth of the Nile 309 

XXXVII The Smile of the Sphinx 315 

XXXVIII Ways that Are Egyptian 322 

XXXIX Where History Began 328 

XL Karnak and Luxor 335 

XLI The Still Valley of the Kings .... 346 

XLII The Highway of Egypt 359 

XLIII Other Ways that Are Egyptian .... 370 

XLIV Sakkara and the Sacred Bulls . . . . 377 

XLV A Visit with Rameses II 382 

XLVI The Long Way Home 391 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



WE CHANGED OUR MINDS ABOUT BEING WILLING TO 

SAIL PAST Frontispiece 

to me it was all true, all romance all poetry page 3 

somebody sent me a basket of fruit " 1 3 

they are an attractive lot the reprobates . . " 17 

gave him the " icy mitt " " 21 

they could dive like seals " 33 

two men take you in hand, and away you go . " 38 

did a sort of fandarole " 41 

then it dawned upon the diplomat " 43 

but now gibraltar, the crouching lion of trafal- 
gar, had risen from the sea " 49 

we could have listened all night to benunes . " 53 

"that is the kasba" " 66 

one does not hurry the orient one waits on it " 68 

marvellous baskets and queer things .... " 72 

we did not care much for parks " 74 

eternally east with no hint of the outside world " 76 
two bent, wrinkled women weaving lace outside 

the door " io9 

we looked across the entrance and tmere rose 

THE ACROPOLIS, HIGH AGAINST THE BLUE. . . Facing p. 12 2 
HE WOULD SWING HIS ARMS AND BEGIN, " YOU SEE !" 

THE REST REQUIRED A MIND-READER .... Page I24 
I WOULD HAVE APPLIED FOR THE POSITION IN THE 

CHORUS MYSELF " 129 

TOOK TURNS ADDRESSING THE MULTITUDE .... " 131 

ONE'S AGE, STATED ON OATH, GOES WITH A PASSPORT . " I48 

KEYEFF " 150 

I WANTED TO CARRY AWAY ONE OF THOSE TOMBSTONES " 189 

vii 



Illustrations 



ALL THE PLAINS AND SLOPES OF THE OLD CITY, WITH 
ITS WHITE FRAGMENTS AND POOR RUINED HAR- 
BOR, LAY AT OUR FEET Facing p. 1 98 

FROM THE TIME OF ADAM, BAALBEC BECAME A PLACE 

OF ALTARS " 2l6 

SO THE PATRIARCHS JOURNEYED; SO, TWO THOUSAND 
YEARS LATER, JOSEPH AND MARY TRAVELLED INTO 

EGYPT Page 225 

URGING US TO PARTAKE OF THE PRECIOUS STUFF, WITH- 
OUT STINT ; " 243 

ASKED HIM IF HE WOULDN'T EXECUTE A LITTLE COM- 
MISSION FOR ME IN THE BAZAARS 249 

THE PATRIARCH KNEW ALL ABOUT JAFFA " 264 

JERUSALEM— ITS BUBBLE-ROOFED HOUSES AND DOMES, 

ITS CYPRESS AND OLIVE TREES Facing p. 294 

A CAMEL TRAIN LED THE WAY THROUGH THE GATES " 3OO 

THE DEPTH OF THEIR FALL " 302 

THE WAY OF THE CROSS " 304 

THE TRUE GOLGOTHA THE PLACE OF THE SKULL . " 306 

A VAST INDIFFERENCE TO ALL PUNY THINGS ... " 318 

SANCTUARY IN KARNAK " 332 

GADDIS " 332 

I MADE A PICTURE OF THE FLY-BRUSH BRIGADE . . " 338 
ITS MAGNIFICENT PYLONS OR ENTRANCE WALLS . . . 

AND THEN ONCE MORE WE WERE ON THE DONKEYS " 340 
THE TEMPLE OF LUXOR . . . ONCE MORE REFLECTING 

ITS COLUMNS IN THE NILE " 342 

THINK OF WATERING A WHOLE WHEAT-FIELD WITH A 

WELL-SWEEP AND A PAIL " 360 

GOT IT MADE CHEAP SOMEWHERE, WITH HER PICTURE 

CARVED ON THE FRONT OF IT " 386 

SET OUT ON THE LONG, STEADY, ATLANTIC SWING . . Page 2>9 2 



THE SHIP-DWELLERS 



"The grand object of all travel is to see 
the shores of the Mediterranean." 

— Dr. Samuel Johnson. 



THE SHIP-DWELLERS 



i 

THE BOOK, AND THE DREAM 

IT was a long time ago — far back in another cen- 
tury — that my father brought home from the 
village, one evening, a brand-new book. There were 
not so many books in those days, and this was a fine 
big one, with black and gilt covers, and such a lot of 
pictures ! 

I was at an age to claim things. I said the book 
was my book, and, later, petitioned my father to es- 
tablish that claim. (I remember we were climbing 
through the bars at the time, having driven the cows 
to the further pasture.) 

My father was kindly disposed, but conservative; 
that was his habit. He said that I might look at the 
book — that I might even read it, some day, when I 
was old enough, and I think he added that privately 



The Ship -Dwellers 



I might call it mine — a privilege which provided as 
well for any claim I might have on the moon. 

I don't think these permissions altogether satis- 
fied me. I was already in the second reader, and the 
lust of individual ownership was upon me. Besides, 
this was a New Pilgrim's Progress. We had respect 
in our house for the old Pilgrim's Progress, and I had 
been encouraged to search its pages. I had read it, 
or read at it, for a good while, and my claim of owner- 
ship in that direction had never been disputed. Now, 
here was a brand-new one, and the pictures in it looked 
most attractive. I was especially enamoured of the 
frontispiece, "The Pilgrim's Vision," showing the 
"Innocents" on their way "abroad," standing on the 
deck of the Quaker City and gazing at Bible pictures 
in the sky. 

I do not remember how the question of owner- 
ship settled itself. I do remember how the book 
that winter became the nucleus of our family circle, 
and how night after night my mother read aloud 
from it while the rest of us listened, and often the 
others laughed. 

I did not laugh — not then. In the first place, I 
would not, in those days, laugh at any Pilgrim's 
Progress, especially at a new one, and then I had not 
arrived at the point of sophistication where a joke, a 
literary joke, registers. To me it was all true, all 
romance — all poetry — the story of those happy 
voyagers who sailed in a ship of dreams to lands 
beyond the sunrise, where men with turbans, long 
flowing garments and Bible whiskers rode on camels ; 
where ruined columns rose in a desert that was once 



The Book, and the Dream 



a city ; where the Sphinx and the Pyramids looked out 
over the sands that had drifted about them long and 
long before the Wise Men of the East had seen the 
Star rise over Bethlehem. 

In the big, bleak farm-house on the wide, bleak 
Illinois prairie I looked into the open fire and dreamed. 




TO ME IT WAS ALL TRUE, ALL ROMANCE ALL POETRY 



Some day, somehow, I would see those distant lands. 
I would sail away on that ship with "Dan" and 
"Jack" and "The Doctor" to the Far East; I 
would visit Damascus and Jerusalem, and pitch my 
camp on the borders of the Nile. Very likely I should 
decide to remain there and live happy ever after. 

How the dreams of youth stretch down the years, 
and fade, and change! Only this one did not fade, 
and I thought it did not change. I learned to laugh 
with the others, by-and-by, but the romance and the 

3 . 



The Ship -Dwellers 



poetry of the pilgrimage did not grow dim. The 
argonauts of the Quaker City sailed always in a halo 
of romance to harbors of the forgotten days. As 
often as I picked up the book the dream was fresh 
and new, though realization seemed ever further and 
still further ahead. 

Then all at once, there, just within reach, it lay. 
There was no reason why, in some measure at least, 
I should not follow the track of those old first "In- 
nocents Abroad." Of course, I was dreaming again — 
only, this time, perhaps, I could make the dream 
come true. 

I began to read advertisements. I found that a 
good many shiploads of ''Pilgrims" had followed 
that first little band to the Orient — that the first 
"ocean picnic" steamer, which set sail in June forty- 
two years before, had started a fashion in sea ex- 
cursioning which had changed only in details. Ocean 
picnics to the Mediterranean were made in winter 
now, and the vessels used for them were fully eight 
times as big as the old Quaker City, which had been a 
side-wheel steamer, and grand, no doubt, for her period, 
with a register proudly advertised at eighteen hundred 
tons ! Itineraries, too, varied more or less, but Greece, 
Egypt, and the Holy Land were still names to conjure 
with. Advertisements of cruises were plentiful, and 
literature on the subject was luminous and exciting. 
A small table by my bed became gorgeous with pros- 
pectuses in blue and gold and crimson sunset dyes. 
The Sphinx, the Pyramids, and prows of stately 
vessels looked out from many covers and became back- 
grounds for lofty, dark-blue camels and dusky men 

4 



The Book, and the Dream 



of fantastic dress. Often I woke in the night and lit 
my lamp and consulted these things. When I went 
to the city I made the lives of various agents miserable 
with my inquiries. It was hard — it was nerve-rack- 
ing to decide. But on one of these occasions I over- 
heard the casual remark that the S. S. Grosser Kurfiirst 
would set out on her cruise to the Orient with two 
tons of dressed chicken and four thousand bottles of 
champagne. 

I hesitated no longer. Dear me, my dream had 
changed, then, after all! Such things had not in the 
least concerned the boy who had looked into the 
open fire, and pictured a pilgrimage to Damascus and 
Jerusalem, and a camp on the borders of the Nile. 

My remembrance of the next few days is hazy — 
that is, it is kaleidoscopic. I recall doing a good 
many things in a hurry and receiving a good deal 
of advice. Also the impression that everybody in 
the world except myself had been everywhere in the 
world, and that presently they were all going again, 
and that I should find them, no doubt, strewn all the 
way from Gibraltar to Jerusalem, when I had been 
persuading myself that in the places I had intended 
to visit I should meet only the fantastic stranger. 
Suddenly it was two days before sailing. Then it 
was the day before sailing. Then it was sailing 
day! 

Perhaps it was the hurry and stress of those last 
days; perhaps it is the feeling natural to such a 
proximity. I do not know. But I do know that 
during those final flying hours, when I was looking 
across the very threshold of realization, the old fas- 

5 



The Ship -Dwellers 



cination faded, and if somebody had only suggested 
a good reason for my staying at home, I would have 
stayed there, and I would have given that person 
something valuable, besides. But nobody did it. 
Not a soul was thoughtful enough to hint that I was 
either needed or desired in my native land, and I was 
too modest to mention it myself. 

There had been rain, but it was bright enough 
that February morning of departure — just a bit 
squally along the west. What a gay crowd there 
was at the pier and on the vessel! I thought all of 
New York must be going. That was a mistake — they 
were mostly visitors, as I discovered later. It would 
average three visitors to one passenger, I should think. 
I had more than that — -twice as many. I am not 
boasting — they came mainly to be sure that I got 
aboard and stayed there, and to see that I didn't lose 
most of my things. They knew me and what I would 
be likely to do, alone. They wanted to steer me 
to the right state-room and distribute my traps. Then 
they could put me in charge of Providence and the 
deck-steward, and wash their hands of me, and feel 
that whatever happened they had done their duty 
and were not to blame. 

So I had six, as I say, and we worked our way 
through, among the passengers and visitors, who 
seemed all to be talking and laughing at once or paw- 
ing over mail and packages heaped upon the cabin 
table. I didn't feel like laughing and talking, and 
I wasn't interested in the mail. Almost everybody 
in the world that meant anything to me was in my 
crowd, and they were going away, presently, to leave 

6 



The Book, and the Dream 



me on this big ship, among strangers, bound for the 
strange lands. My long dream of the Orient dwindled 
to a decrepit thing. 

But presently we found my state-room, and it was 
gratifying. I was impressed with its regal furnish- 
ings. After all, there were compensations in a 
habitation like that. Besides, there were always 
the two tons of dressed chicken and those thousands of 
champagne. I became more cheerful. 

Only, I wish the ship people wouldn't find it neces- 
sary to blow their whistle so loud and suddenly to 
send one's friends ashore. There is no chance to 
carry off somebody — somebody you would enjoy 
having along. They blow that thing until it shivers 
the very marrow of one's soul. 

How the visitors do crowd ashore! A word — a 
last kiss — a "God bless you" — your own are gone 
presently — you are left merely standing there, aban- 
doned, marooned, deserted — feeling somehow that 
it's all wrong, and that something ought to be done 
about it. Why don't those people hurry? You 
want to get away now; you want it over with. 

A familiar figure fights its way up the gang-plank, 
breasting the shoreward tide. Your pulse jumps — 
they are going to take you home, after all. But no, 
he only comes to tell you that your six will be at a 
certain place near the end of the dock, where you 
can see them, and wave to them. 

You push to the ship's side for a place at the rail. 
The last visitors are straggling off now, even to the 
final official. Then somewhere somebody does some- 
thing that slackens the cables, the remaining gang- 

7 



The Ship -Dwellers 



plank is dragged away. That whistle again, and then 
a band — our band — turns loose a perfect storm of 
music. 

We are going ! We are going ! We have dropped 
away from the pier and are gliding past the rows of 
upturned faces, the lines of frantic handkerchiefs. 
Yes, oh yes, we are going — there is no turning back 
now, no changing of one's mind again. All the cares 
of work, the claims of home — they cannot reach us 
any more. Those waiting at the pier's end to wave 
as we pass — whatever life holds for me is centred 
there, and I am leaving it all behind. There they are, 
now! Wave! Wave! Oh, I did not know it would 
be like this! I did not suppose that I might — need 
another handkerchief! 

The smoke of a tug drifts between — I have lost 
them. No, there they are again, still waving. That 
white spot — that is a little furry coat — such a little 
furry coat and getting so far off, and so blurry. My 
glass — if I can only get hold of myself enough to see 
through it. Yes, there they are! Oh, those wretched 
boats to drift in and shut that baby figure away! 
Now they are gone, but I cannot find her again. 
The smoke, the mist, and a sudden drift of snow have 
swept between. I have lost the direction — I don't 
know where to look any more. It is all over — we are 
off — we are going out to sea ! 



II 



IN THE TRACK OF THE INNOCENTS 

WE are through luncheon; we have left Sandy 
Hook, and the shores have dropped behind 
the western horizon. It was a noble luncheon we 
sat down to as we crossed the lower bay. One 
stopped at the serving-table to admire an exhibition 
like that. Banked up in splendid pyramids as for 
a World's Fair display, garnished and embroidered 
and fringed with every inviting trick of decoration, 
it was a spectacle to take one's breath and make him 
resolve to consume it all. One felt that he could 
recover a good deal on a luncheon like that, but I 
think the most of us recovered too much . I am sure, 
now, that I did — a good deal too much — and that 
my selections were not the best — not for the beginning 
of a strange, new life at sea. 

Then there was Laura — Laura, age fourteen, whose 
place at the table is next to mine, and a rather sturdy 
young person ; I think she also considered the bill of 
fare too casually. She ventured the information that 
this was her second voyage, that the first had been a 
short trip on a smaller vessel, and that she had been 
seasick. She did not intend to be seasick on a fine, 
big steamer like this, and I could tell by the liberality 

9 



The Ship -Dwellers 



with which she stowed away the satisfying German 
provender that she had enjoyed an early and light 
breakfast, followed by brisk exercise in getting to the 
ship. The tables were gay with flowers; the com- 
pany looked happy, handsome, and well-dressed ; the 
music was inspiring. Friends left behind seemed sud- 
denly very far away. We had become a little world 
all to ourselves — most of us strangers to one another, 
but thrown in a narrow compass here and likely to 
remain associates for weeks, even months. What a 
big, jolly picnic it was, after all! 

Outside it was bleak and squally, but no matter. 
The air was fine and salt and invigorating. The old 
Quaker City had been held by storm at anchor in the 
lower bay. We were already down the Narrows and 
heading straight for the open sea. Land presently lost 
its detail and became a dark outline. That, too, sank 
lower and became grayer and fell back into the mist. 

I remembered that certain travellers had display- 
ed strong emotions on seeing their native land dis- 
appear. I had none — none of any consequence. I 
had symptoms, though, and I recognized them. Like 
Laura, aged fourteen, I had taken a shorter voy- 
age on a poorer ship, and I had decided that this 
would be different. I had engaged a steamer-chair, 
and soon after luncheon I thought I would take a 
cigar and a book on Italy and come out here and sit 
in it — in the chair, of course — and smoke and think 
and look out to sea. But when I got to the door of 
my state-room and felt the great vessel take a slow, 
curious side-step and caught a faint whiff of linoleum 
and varnish from the newly renovated cabin, I decided 

IO 



In the Track of the Innocents 



to forego the cigar and guide-book and take a volume 
on mind cure instead. 

It seems a good ship, though, and I feel that we 
shall all learn to be proud of her, in time. In a little 
prospectus pamphlet I have here I find some of her 
measurements and capacities, and I have been com- 
paring them with those of the Quaker City, the first 
steamer to set out on this Oriental cruise. If she 
were travelling along beside us to-da}?- I suppose she 
would look like a private yacht. She must have had 
trouble with a sea like this. She was little more than 
two hundred feet long, I believe, and, as already men- 
tioned, her tonnage was registered at eighteen hundred. 
The figures set down in the prospectus for this vessel 
are a good deal bigger than those, but they are still 
too modest. The figures quote her as being a trifle 
less than six hundred feet long, but I can see in both 
directions from where I sit, and I am satisfied that it 
would take me hours to get either to her bow or stern. 
I don't believe I could do it in that time. I am con- 
vinced that it is at least half a mile to my state-room. 

The prospectus is correct, however, in one item. It 
says that the Kurfiirst has a displacement of twenty- 
two thousand tons. That is handsome, and it is not 
too much; I realized that some moments ago. When 
I felt our noble vessel "sashay" in her slow majestic 
fashion toward Cuba, and then pause to revolve the 
matter a little, and after concluding to sink, suddenly 
set out in a long, slow, upward slide for the moon, I 
knew that her displacement was all that is claimed 
for it, and I prepared for the worst; so did Laura, 
and started for her state-room suddenly. . . . 

ii 



The Ship - Dwellers 



Later: I don't know how many of our party went 
down to dinner. I know one that did not go. The 
music is good, but I can hear it very well from where I * 
am. No doubt the dinner is good, too, but I am 
.satisfied to give it absent treatment. 

There is a full-blown Scientist in the next room. She 
keeps saying "Mind is all. Mind is all. This is nothing. 
This is — this is just — " after which, the Earthquake. 

What an amazing ocean it is to be able to toss this 
mighty ship about in such a way ! I suppose there is 
no hope of her sinking. No hope ! 

Somebody sent me a basket of fruit. I vaguely 
wonder what it is like, and if I shall ever know? I 
suppose there are men who could untie that paper 
and look at it. I could stand in awe of a man like 
that. I could — 

However, it is no matter; there is no such man. 

But it was bright next morning, though a heavy 
sea was still running. I was by no means perfectly 
happy, but I struggled on deck quite early, and 
found company. A stout youngish man was marching 
round and round vigorously as if the number of laps 
he might achieve was vital. He fetched up suddenly 
as I stepped on deck. He spoke with quick energy. 

"Look here," he said, earnestly, "perhaps you can 
tell me; it's important, and I want to know: is a 
seasick man better off if he walks or sits still? I'm 
seasick. I confess it, fully. My interior economy is 
all disqualified, and I want advice. Now tell me, is 
a seasick man better off when he walks or when he 
sits still?" 



In the Track of the Innocents 



I gave it up, and the Diplomat (we learned later 
that he was connected with the consular service) 
passed to the next possible source of information. I 
heard him propounding his inquiries several times dur- 
ing the morning as new arrivals appeared on deck. 




SOMEBODY SENT ME A BASKET OF FRUIT 



He was the most honest man on the ship. The rest 
of us did not confess that we were seasick. We had a 
bad cold or rheumatism or dyspepsia or locomotor- 
ataxia or pleurisy — all sorts of things — but we were 
not seasick. It was remarkable what a floating 
hospital of miscellaneous complaints the ship had 
2 13 



The Ship -Dwellers 



become, and how suddenly they all disappeared that 
afternoon when the sea went down. 

It was Lincoln's Birthday, and, inspired by the 
lively appearance of the deck, a kindly promoter of 
entertainment went among the passengers inviting 
them to take part in some sort of simple exercises for 
the evening. Our pleasure excursion seemed really 
to have begun now, and walking leisurely around 
the promenade-deck one could get a fair impression 
of our company and cast the horoscope. They were 
a fair average of Americans, on the whole, with a 
heavy percentage of foreign faces, mostly German. 
Referring to the passenger-list, one discovered that 
we hailed from many States ; but when I drifted into 
the German purlieus of that register and found such 
prefixes as Herr Regierungs-prasident a. D., and Frau 
Regierungs-prasident a. D., and looking further dis- 
covered Herr Kommerzienrat, Herr Oberprasidialrat 
von, and a few more high-power explosives like that, I 
said, "This is not an excursion, after all; it is a court 
assembly." I did not know in the least what these 
titles meant, but I was uneasy. I had the feeling that 
the owner of any one of them could nod to the execu- 
tioner and dismiss me permanently from the ship. 
The interpreter came along just then. He said: 

' ' Do not excite yourself. They are not so dangerous 
as they look. It is only as one would say, 'Mr. and 
Mrs. Councilmanofthethirdward Jones, or Mr. Mayor- 
ofOshkosh Smith, or Mrs. Commissionerofhighways 
Brown.' It is pure decoration; nothing fatal will 
occur." I felt better then, and set out to identify 
some of the owners of this furniture. It was as the 

14 



In the Track of the Innocents 



interpreter had said — there was no danger. A man 
with a six-story title could hardly be distinguished 
from the rest of his countrymen except when he tried 
to sign it. But a thing like that must be valuable in 
Germany; otherwise he would not go to the trouble 
and expense of lugging such a burden around on a 
trip like this, when one usually wants to travel 
light. 

The ship gave us a surprise that night, and it was 
worth while. When we got to the dining-room we 
found it decorated with 'the interwoven colors of two 
nations; the tables likewise radiant, and there were 
menus with the picture of Abraham Lincoln outside. 
We were far out in the blackness of the ocean now, 
but here was as brilliant a spot as you would find 
at Sherry's or Delmonico's, and a little company gath- 
ered from the world's end to do honor to the pioneer 
boy of Kentucky. I think many of us there had 
never observed Lincoln's Birthday before, and it was 
fitting enough that we should begin at such a time 
and place. I know we all rose and joined in America 
and the Star -Spangled Banner at the close, and we 
are not likely to forget that mid-ocean celebration of 
the birth of America's greatest, gentlest hero. 



Ill 



DAYS AT SEA 



E have settled down into a pleasant routine of 



V V lazy life. Most of us are regularly on deck 
now, though one sees new faces daily. 

We have taken up such amusements as please us — 
reading, games, gossip, diaries, picture-puzzles, and 
there are even one or two mild flirtations discoverable. 
In the ''booze-bazaar" (the Diplomat's name for the 
smoking-room) the Reprobates find solace in pleasant 
mixtures and droll stories, while they win one another's 
money at diverting games. They are an attractive 
lot — the Reprobates. One can hardly tear himself 
away from them. Only the odors of the smoking- 
room are not quite attractive, as yet. I am no longer 
seasick — at least, not definitely so; but I still say 
"Mind is all" as I pass through the smoking-room. 

We are getting well acquainted, too, for the brief 
period of time we have been together. It does not 
seem brief, however. That bleak day of departure in 
North River is already far back in the past — as far 
back as if it belonged to another period, which indeed 
it does. We are becoming acquainted, as I say. We 
are rapidly finding out one another's names ; whether 
we are married, single, or divorced — and why; what, 
if anything, we do when we are at home; how we 
happened to come on this trip; and a great deal of 




Days at Sea 



useful information — useful on a ship like this, where 
the voyage is to be a long one and associations more or 
less continuous. We form into little groups and dis- 
cuss these things — our own affairs first — then present- 
ly we shift the personnel of our groups and discuss 
each other, and are happy and satisfied, and feel 
that the cruise is a success. 

There are not many young people on the ship — 
a condition which would seem to have prevailed on 
these long ocean excursions since the first Oriental 
pilgrimage, forty-two years ago. I suppose the pros- 




THEY ARE AN ATTRACTIVE LOT — THE REPROBATES 



pects of several months on one ship, with sight-seeing 
in Egypt and the Holy Land, do not look attractive 
enough to the average young person who is thinking 
of gayer things. One can be gay enough on ship- 
board, however, where there is a good band of music; 
a quarter-deck to dance on ; nooks on the sun-deck to 

i7 



The Ship -Dwellers 



flirt in ; promenades and shuffleboard, with full dress 
every night for dinner. No need to have an idle 
time on an excursion like this if one doesn't want it; 
which most of us do, however, because we are no 
longer entirely young, and just loaf around and talk 
of unimportant things and pretend to read up on the 
places we are going to see. 

We need to do that. What we don't know about 
history and geography on this ship would sink it. 
Most of us who have been to school, even if it is a good 
while ago, keep sort of mental pictures of the hemi- 
spheres, and preserve the sound of certain old familiar 
names. We live under the impression that this is 
knowledge, and it passes well enough for that until a 
time comes like this when particular places on the 
map are to be visited and particular associations are 
to be recalled. Then, of course, we start in to classify 
and distinguish, and suddenly find that there is 
scarcely anything to classify and less still to distin- 
guish. I am morally certain that there are not ten 
of us on this vessel who could tell with certainty the 
difference between Deucalion and Deuteronomy, or 
between the Pillars of Hercules and the Golden Horn. 
The brightest man on the ship this morning asked if 
Algiers was in Egypt or Spain, and a dashing high- 
school girl wanted to know if Greece were not a part 
of Asia Minor. 

We shall all know better when we are through 
with this trip. We shall be wonders in the matter 
of knowledge, and we shall get it from first hands. 
We shall no longer confuse Upper and Lower Egypt, 
or a peristyle with a stadium. We are going to 

18 



Days at Sea 



know about these things. That is why we are 
here. 

In the matter of our amusements, picture-puzzles 
seem to be in the lead. They are fascinating things, 
once one gets the habit. They sell them on this ship, 
and nearly everybody has one or more. The tables 
in the forward cabin are full of them, and after dinner 
there is a group around each table pawing over the 
pieces in a rapt way or offering advice to whoever 
happens to be setting them. Certain of our middle- 
aged ladies in particular find comfort in the picture- 
puzzles, and sit all day in their steamer-chairs with 
the pieces on a large pasteboard cover, shifting and 
trying and fitting them into place. One wonders 
what blessing those old Quaker City pilgrims had that 
took the place of the fascinating picture-puzzle. 

We are getting south now, and the weather is much 
warmer. The sun is bright, too, and a little rainbow 
travels with the ship, just over the port screw. When 
the water is fairly quiet the decks are really gay. New 
faces still appear, however. Every little while there 
is a fresh arrival, as it were; a fluttering out from 
some inner tangle of sea magic and darkness, just as a 
butterfly might emerge from a cocoon. Some of them 
do not stay. We run into a cross-sea or a swell, or 
something, and they disappear again, and their places 
at the table remain vacant. The Diplomat continues 
his fight and his inquiries. Every little while one 
may hear him ask : "Is it better for a seasick man to 
walk or to sit down?" The Diplomat never denies 
his condition. "Oh, Lord, I'm seasick!" he says. 
"I'd be sick on a duck-pond. I'd be sick if the ship 

19 



The Ship -Dwellers 



were tied to the dock. I'd be sick if anybody told me 
I was on a ship. Say, what is a fellow like that to do, 
anyway? And here I am bound for Jerusalem!" 

Down here the water is very blue. We might be 
sailing on a great tub of indigo. One imagines that 
to take up a glass of it would be to dip up pure ultra- 
marine. I mentioned this to the Diplomat. 

"Yes," he said, "it is a cracker-jack of an ocean, 
but I don't care for it just now." 

But what a lonely ocean it is ! Not a vessel, not a 
sail, not a column of smoke on the horizon! 

We are officially German on this ship, and the 
language prevails. Our passenger- list shows that we 
are fully half German, I believe, and of course all the 
officers and stewards are of that race. The conse- 
quence is that everybody on the ship, almost, speaks 
or tries to speak the language. Persons one would 
never suspect of such a thing do it, and some of them 
pretty well, too. Even I got reckless and shameless, 
and from a long-buried past produced a few German 
remarks of my own. They were only about ten-carat 
assay, but they were accepted at par. I remember 
an old and very dear German man in America who 
once said to me, speaking of his crops, "Der early 
corn, he iss all right; aber der late corn, she's bad!" 

My German is not as good as his English, but you'd 
think it was better, the serious way these stewards 
accept it. They recognize the quality — they have 
many cargoes of the same brand. 

We have two exceedingly pretty girls on this ship — 
one of them as amiable, as gentle, as lovely in every 
way as she is pretty. The other — well, she is pretty 

20 



Days at Sea 



enough in all conscience, and she may be amiable — I 
wouldn't want to be unfair in my estimate — but if 
she is, she has a genius for concealing it from the 
rest of the passengers. Her chief characteristic be- 
sides her comeliness seems to be a conviction that 
she has made a mistake in coming with such a crowd. 

We can't domesticate that girl — she won't mix 
with us. The poor old Promoter, one of the kindliest 




creatures alive, approached her with an invitation to 
read aloud a small selection for the little Lincoln 
memorial he was preparing. She declined chillily — 
gave him the "icy mitt, " the Diplomat said. 

21 



The Ship -Dwellers 



"I nevah do anything on shipboahd," she declared, 
and ignored his apologies. 

She spends most of her time disposed in a ravish- 
ing fashion in a steamer-chair, reading a novel or 
letting the volume drop listlessly at her side, with 
one of her dainty fingers between the pages to mark 
the place, while her spirit lives in other worlds than 
ours. The Promoter says she is cold and frigidly 
beautiful — a winter landscape. But then the Pro- 
moter is a simple, forgiving soul. I think she is just 
flitter and frosting — just a Christmas-card. A ship 
like this is democratic — it has to be. We are all just 
people here. 

It is also cosmopolitan — it has to be that, too, with 
a crowd like ours. This Sunday evening affords an 
example of what I mean. In the dining-room forward 
there are religious exercises — prayers and a song 
service under the direction of the Promoter — a 
repetition, no doubt, of the very excellent programme 
given this morning. Far aft, on the quarter-deck, a 
dance is in progress, under the direction, I believe, 
of our German contingent; while amidships, in the 
' ' booze-bazaar, ' ' the Reprobates and their Godless 
friends are engaged in revelry, probably under the 
direction of Satan. The ship is very long, and the 
entertainments do not conflict or compete. One may 
select whatever best accords with his taste and morals, 
or, if he likes variety, he may divide his time. Every- 
thing is running wide open as this luminous speck of 
life — a small, self-constituted world — goes throbbing 
through the dark. 



IV 



WE BECOME HISTORY 

WE had been four days at sea, boring our way 
into the sunrise at the rate of three hundred and 
sixty miles a day, when we met the "Great Sight" — 
the American fleet of sixteen ships of war returning 
from its cruise around the world. 

It had been rumored among us when we left New 
York that there was a possibility of such a meeting. 
It was only a possibility, of course, for even a fleet is 
a mere speck on a wide waste of ocean, and with 
engines on both sides driving at full speed the chances 
of intersection were small. 

So we went about figuring and speculating and 
worrying the officers, who were more anxious over 
the matter than we were, but conservative, never- 
theless. We only learned, therefore, or rather we 
guessed, I think, that our Marconi flash was travelling 
out beyond the horizon, and the loneliest sea imagin- 
able, trying to find an answering spark. 

During the afternoon of the Sunday previously 
mentioned a sentence on the blackboard, the first 
official word, announced, with a German flavor, that 
it was "not quite impossible" that the meeting would 
occur next morning, and this we took to mean that 
wireless communication had been established, though 
we were not further informed. 

2 3 



The Ship -Dwellers 



There was a wild gale during the night and a heavy- 
sea running at daybreak, but the sky was clear. A 
few stragglers were at early breakfast when, all at 
once, a roll of drums and a burst of martial music 
brought us to our feet. 

We did not need any one to tell us what it meant. 
"The fleet!" came to every man's lips, and a moment 
later we were on deck. Not only those in the dining- 
room came. Sick or well, bundled together somehow, 
from every opening our excursionists staggered forth, 
and, climbing to the sun-deck, looked out across the 
bridge to where the sunrise had just filled the morning 
sky. There they were — far, faint, and blurred at 
first, but presently outlined clear — stretched across 
the glowing east, lifting and tossing out of the morn- 
ing, our sixteen noble vessels on their homeward way ! 

At that moment I think there was not one on our 
ship who did not feel that whatever might come, now, 
the cruise was a success. Foreign lands would bring 
us grand sights, no doubt, but nothing that could 
equal this. We realized that, fully, and whispered 
our good-fortune to one another as we gazed out upon 
that spectacle of a lifetime. 

Viewed across our bow, the vessels appeared to 
form a continuous straight line, but they divided into 
two sections as they came on, eight vessels in each, 
and passed in column formation. In a little while 
we were close to them — they were just under our 
starboard bow — their upper decks black with men 
turned out in our honor. We waved to them and our 
band played, but we did not cheer. We were too 
much impressed to be noisy, nor could we have made 

24 



We Become History 



our voices heard across that wild shouting sea. So 
we only looked, and waved, and perhaps wiped our 
eyes, and some of us tried to photograph them. 

They passed in perfect formation. Heavy seas 
broke over them, and every billow seemed to sweep 
their decks, but their lines varied not a point and the 
separating distances remained unchanged. So per- 
fect was the alignment that each column became a 
single vessel when they had left us behind. 

It was over, all too soon. Straight as an arrow 
those two noble lines pierced the western horizon, 
passed through it, and were gone. We went below 
then, to find chairs flying, crockery smashing, and 
state-rooms in a wreck. It was the rough day of the 
trip, but we declared that we did not mind it at all. 
By wireless we thanked Admiral Sperry, and wished 
him safe arrival home. Then presently he returned 
thanks, and good wishes for our journey in distant 
lands. 

We meant to vote resolutions of gratitude to our 
captain that night at dinner for his skill in rinding the 
fleet. But it was our rough day, as I have mentioned, 
and nobody was there to do it — at least, there was not 
enough for a real, first-class, able-bodied resolution. 
We did it next evening — that is, to-night. Between 
the asparagus and the pheasant we told him some 
of the nice things we thought of him, and ended up 
by drinking his health, standing, and by giving a 
great "Hoch soil er leben!" in real German fashion. 

We were vain and set up, and why not ? Had we 
not been the first Americans to give our fleet welcome 
home ? We felt that we had become almost history. 

25 



V 



INTRODUCING THE REPROBATES 

WE are a week at sea now, and have been making 
our courtesy to the sunrise half an hour earlier 
every morning. That is to say, we have gained three 
hours and a half, and when the first bugle blows for 
half-past seven, and commands us to get up and muss 
around and be ready for the next bugle half an hour 
later, it means in the well-regulated civilized country 
we've left behind that it's just four o'clock, and time 
to turn over and settle down and really enjoy life. 
The result is you swear at the bugler, when you ought 
to love him for the trouble he takes to get you up in 
time for breakfast. 

After breakfast, the deck. It is good to walk 
around and around the promenade these fine mornings 
down here, even though the sea keeps billowy and 
the horizon line lifts and falls with its majestic swing. 
You are no longer disturbed by it. Your body has 
adapted itself to the motion, and sways like an inverted 
pendulum. You feel that you have your sea- legs 
almost as well as the stewards, and this makes you 
proud and showy before the other passengers. It is 
February, but it is not cold down in this violet, semi- 
tropic sea. The air is fresh enough, but it is soft and 
gratifying, and one almost imagines that he can smell 
flowers in it. Perhaps it is a fact, too, for we are not 

26 



Introducing the Reprobates 



far from land now ; we shall reach Madeira to-morrow 
morning. 

Yet somehow the thought of land is not exciting. 
I do not believe any of us are eager for it. We are 
quite restored now, even the Diplomat, and the days 
on shipboard are serene and pleasantly satisfying. 

So many happy things go to make up the day. 
It is refreshing to play shuffleboard on the after deck 
with Laura, age fourteen, and her companion, the 
only other girl of her age on board. It is inspiring 
to hear the band play every morning at ten when one 
is not too close to the strenuous music. I suppose 
beating a bass drum and cymbals makes muscle, and 
the man does not realize how strong he is. It is 
diverting to drift into the smoking-room — now that 
I do not mind its fragrance any more — and watch the 
Apostle (so christened because of his name and 
general build and inspired look) winning money from 
the Colonel at piquet,while the Horse Doctor discusses 
the philosophies of life in a manner at least pleasing 
to the unregenerates. 

I should add, I suppose, that the Horse Doctor is 
not really that by profession, but having been dubbed 
so one day by his fellow- Reprobates, the Apostle and 
the Colonel, his cheerful reply: "Yes, I expect to be 
taken for one — travelling, as I do, with a couple of 
asses," fixed the title for him permanently. We enjoy 
the Reprobates. They are so ingenuous in th?ir 
morals, and are corrupting the smoking-room in such 
a frank, unrestricted way. We enjoy their arguments 
too, they are so free and personal. We disapprove 
of the Reprobates, but we love them because we are 

27 



The Ship -Dwellers 



human and born in sin, and they stand for all things 
we would like to do — if we dared. 

It is inviting and comfortable almost anywhere on 
the ship these days. It is good just to sit in the sun 
and dream ; to lean over the rail and watch the little 
rainbow that travels with us, the white lace that the 
ship makes in its majestic sweep, to wander back to 
the stern and follow the interminable wake of the 
screw as it stretches back beyond the horizon line. 
Then there is the sunset; it was wonderful to-night. 
The air was perfectly clear, the sun a red disk going 
down cleanly cut into the sea. Laura and I saw it 
from amidships, looking out across the high stern of 
the vessel that sank now below the horizon, then 
lifted into the sky. Even the chief engineer and 
the ship's doctor came out to look at it, and told us 
to watch for the green sun which would appear the 
instant after setting. Later — after dinner, I mean — 
we danced. 

They have put a stout awning over the quarter-deck 
and strung a lot of electric globes there so that when 
the music is going and the illumination is turned on, 
the place is gay and pretty and cosey, and those of us 
who have not danced for twenty years or more begin 
to sit up straighter when the music starts, and present- 
ly we forget that all is vanity and life a sorry mess at 
best, and look about for a partner, and there on the 
wide, lifting, falling quarter - deck caper away the 
years. It is not so much wonder, then, that the 
prospect of land does not arouse any feverish interest. 
We are willing to go right on sailing for a while and 
not bother about land at all. 

28 




VI 

A LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE 

IT was a mistake, however, to be indifferent to Ma- 
deira. We are no longer so. Whatever enthusi- 
asm we lacked beforehand we have acquired now. Of 
all fair, jewelled islands of the sea, it is the particular 
gem. Not one of us on this ship but has made up his 
mind to go to Madeira again some day, and to stay 
there and live happy ever after; or, if not during life, 
to try to exchange a corner of heaven for it when he 
dies. 

We knew nothing about Madeira except what the 
little prospectus told us, and the day before arrival 
we began to look up guide-book "information on the 
subject. There was not much of this on the 
ship; I suspect that there is not much anywhere. 
Madeira was known to the Phoenicians, of course, 
that race of people who knew everything, went every- 
where, built all the first cities, invented all the arts, 
named everything, and then perished. I ought to be 
3 29 



The Ship -Dwellers 



sorry that they perished, I suppose, but I'm not. I've 
heard enough of that tribe on this ship. 

The Patriarch is stuffed full of Phoenician statistics, 
and to touch any line of historical discussion in his 
hearing is like tripping over a cord attached to a 
spring gun. He is as fatal as an Irishman I once 
knew who was perfectly adorable until some question 
of race came up. Then it was time to stand from 
under. According to Malone there was originally 
but one race — the Irish. All the early saints were 
Irish ; so was Abraham ; so was Noah ; so was Adam ; 
so was — but that is far enough back. I remember 
hearing him tell one night how, in a later day, when 
Alexander the Great set out to conquer Asia, he first 
sent emissaries to make peace with Ireland as a pre- 
caution against being attacked in the rear. 

But I am beginning to wander. There is no trace 
of the Phoenicians, I believe, on Madeira to-day, and 
the early history of the island is mainly mythical. 
When ancient Mediterranean sailors went exploring 
a little into the Atlantic and saw its purple form rise 
on the horizon they decided that it must be the mouth 
of hell, or at all events the abode of evil creatures, 
and hastily turned back. One account says that in 
the course of time a gentleman named Taxicab — 
probably the inventor of the vehicle later known by 
that name — and his companion were shipwrecked on 
Madeira and set up a monument in celebration of 
the event. I don't know what became of Taxicab 
and his friend or the monument, but about the same 
time it was discovered again by a Portuguese named 
Zargo, who set it afire as a means of clearing the land 

30 



A Land of Heart's Desire 



of its splendid forests and kept the fires going for 
seven years. 1 

Zargo's devastation began about five hundred years 
ago, and the island has required all those centuries 
for recovery. It may be added that he believed 
Madeira to be the lost Atlantis, though a point of 
land thirty miles long and fifteen miles wide could 
hardly be more than a splinter of that vanished 
continent. More likely Madeira and the fragmentary 
islets about it formed that mythical Ultima Thule 
referred to by Ulysses, when, according to Tennyson, 
he said : 

" My purpose holds 
To sail beyond the sunset and the baths 
Of all the western stars, until I die. 
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: 
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, 
And see the great Achilles whom we knew." 

Perhaps Madeira was indeed a home of gods and 
favored spirits in the olden days. It would have 
been a suitable place. When we drew near enough 
to see its terraced hills — lofty hills they are, some of 
them in the interior rising to a point six thousand feet 
above the sea — and to make out the tiny houses 
nestling like white and tinted shells against the green, 
we changed our minds about being willing to sail past 
without stopping, and when at last we swung slowly 
into the Harbor of Funchal we felt somehow that 

1 By referring again to the German guide-book I find that the 
first gentleman's name was not Taxicab, but as that is nearer to 
what it looks like than anything that can be made out of the real 
name I will let it stand. 

31 



The Ship -Dwellers 



we had come upon an island enchantment in the 
middle of the sea. 

For everything was so marvellous in its beauty: 
the green hills, terraced almost to the very top; the 
gorges between, the little fairy city just where the 
hills flow into the sea. With glasses one could make 
out flowering vines on many of the walls. Even with 
the naked eye, somebody presently discovered a great 
purple mass, part way up the hillside. The glass 
showed it to be a house almost covered with bougain- 
villea — our first vision of this lavish and splendid 
flower of the Mediterranean. 

As we drew in and came to anchor, we saw descend- 
ing upon us a fleet of small, curious boats, filled 
with half-naked men. We prepared for the worst, 
but they merely wanted us to throw coins over in 
the liquid azure which they call water in this country, 
whereupon their divers would try to intercept the 
said coins somewhere between the top and bottom of 
the sea. We didn't believe they could do it, which 
was poor judgment on our part. 

If those amphibians did not always get the coins, 
they generally did. They could see them perfectly 
in that amazing water, and they could dive like seals. 
Some of the divers were mere children — poor, lean 
creatures who stood up in their boats and shouted and 
implored and swung their arms in a wild invitation 
to us to fling our money overboard. They did not 
want small money — at least, not very small money — 
they declined to dive for pennies. Perhaps they could 
only distinguish the gleam of the white metal. Let 
a nickel or a dime be tossed over and two or three 

32 



A Land of Heart's Desire 




THEY COULD DIVE LIKE SEALS 



were after it in a flash, while a vehement outbreak of 
Portuguese from all the rest entreated still further 
largess. It was really a good show, and being the 
first of its kind, we enjoyed it. 

We had to go ashore in boats, and the water was 
not smooth. ■ It was not entirely easy to get into the 
landing-boats, and it was still less easy to get out 
at the stairs which ascended to the stone piers. 
Every billow would throw the little boats six or eight 
feet into the air, and one had to be pretty careful to 
step just at the right instant or he would leave one 
foot on a high step and the other in the boat, far below. 
Several of our best passengers were dismembered in 
that way. 

33 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Once on shore, the enchantment took hold of us 
again. It was so sunny and bright and the streets 
were so attractive — all paved with small black cobbles, 
set in the neatest and most careful fashion. Our con- 
veyances were waiting just at the end of the pier, 
and they were, I believe, the most curious convey- 
ances in the world. They were not carriages or carts 
or wheeled vehicles of any sort, but sleds — here in 
a land of eternal summer — sleds with enclosed tops, 
and drawn by oxen. 

Their drivers were grave, whiskered men who 
motioned us to get in; after which we started, and 
they began greasing the runners as we went along. 
They did this by putting a grease-soaked rag in front 
of a runner now and then and driving over it. 

I don't think an American would do it that way. 
He would take a barrel of soft soap and a broom and 
lubricate the whole street. Their way is neater, and 
about as effective, I suppose ; besides, when they 
have been doing it another three hundred years or 
so, they will have some grease on these streets, too. 
Already one may see indications of it here and 
there. 

Our course was uphill, and we ascended along a 
panorama of sunny life and tinted flower-hung walls 
to the outskirts of that neatest and most charming 
of cities — continuously expressing our delight in the 
general attractiveness of everything: the wonder- 
fully laid streets; the really beautiful sidewalks 
of very tiny vari-colored cobbles all set in perfect 
mosaic patterns; the glow and bloom of summer 
everywhere. We admired even the persistent little 

34 



A Land of Heart's Desire 



beggars who ran along on both sides of the sleds, 
throwing camellias into our laps, crying out, ''Penny! 
Penny!" their one English word — hopping, dancing, 
beseeching, and refusing to be comforted. 

We gave to the first of these tormentors, but it was 
not a good way to get rid of them. It was like put- 
ting out molasses to satisfy a few flies. A dozen more 
were around us, going on in a most disturbing manner. 
Our driver finally dispersed them by making some 
terrific motions with his whip-handle. 

We were at the outskirts at last, but only at the 
beginning of the real climb. A funicular railway 
takes one up farther, and presently we are ascending 
straight to Paradise, it seemed to us, by a way that 
led through a perfect wilderness of beauty — flower, 
foliage, and waving green, with tiny stucco houses 
set in tangled gardens and slopes of cane — while 
below and beyond lay the city and the harbor and 
our ship at anchor on the violet sea. 

Would we be so enchanted with the magic of this 
Happy Isle if it were not our first landing after a long 
winter voyage, which if not stormy was at all events 
not entirely smooth? Perhaps not, yet I think there 
are certain essentials of beauty and charm that are 
fundamental. The things we dream of and do not 
believe exist ; the things that an artist will paint now 
and then when he forgets that the world is just a place 
to live and toil and die in, and not really to be happy 
in at all. But those things are all here in Madeira, 
and when we learned that nobody ever gets sick here, 
and that everybody gets well of everything he happens 
to have when he comes, we said: "Never mind going 

35 



The Ship -Dwellers 



on; send the ship home, or sink it; we will abide 
here and roam no more." 

At the end of the funicular there was still more hill 
to climb, and one could either do it afoot or be carried 
up in a hammock. Most of us young people did it 
afoot, allowing enfeebled men of eighteen and twenty 
the comfort of the hammocks. As they passed us 
we commented on their luxury, and made it otherwise 
interesting for them. It was pleasant enough walking 
and there was a good deal to see. The foliage was 
interesting, ranging as it did from the palm of the 
tropics to the pine of the northern forests. You can 
raise anything in Madeira, except money — there is 
not much of that, and things are cheap accordingly. 
No doubt it is the same in heaven, but I am getting 
ahead of my story. 

We lunched at the top, in a hotel that was once a 
convent and still has iron-barred windows, but before 
luncheon we walked out for the view to a little plat- 
form which seems when you step out on it to be hang- 
ing in the air, so that you involuntarily hesitate and 
reach for something firm. All the distance you have 
climbed in the ox-sleds, by the funicular, and afoot 
drops away perpendicularly at your feet, and you are 
looking down, straight down, and still down, to what 
seem fairy tree-tops and a wonderful picture valley 
through which a tumbling ribbon of water goes foam- 
ing to the sea. It is the most sudden and dramatic 
bit of scenery I know. 

We had delicious strawberries at our luncheon — 
strawberries that required no sugar — and a good many 
other kinds of fruit — some of which we could identify 

36 



A Land of Heart's Desire 



and some of which the Reprobates discussed in their 
usual unrestrained fashion, calling one another names 
that were at once descriptive and suited to the subject 
in hand. There were pomegranates and guavas and 
comquats and loquats; also there was Madeira wine, 
of course, and hereafter I am going to know some- 
thing about native wines in the lands we visit before 
I begin business — that is, wholesale business. But 
never mind — let it go; it is a good deal like sherry, 
only it tastes better, and the Reprobates said — but 
as I mentioned before, let it go — it really does not 
matter now. 

We descended that long, paved, greased hill in 
toboggans that are nice, comfortable baskets on run- 
ners. They hold two and three, according to size, 
and you get in and two men take you in hand, and 
away you go. You go, too. A distance of two miles 
has been made in three minutes in those things. I 
don't think we went as fast as that, but it was plenty 
fast enough for the wild delight of it, and if I had 
money enough and time enough I would go there 
and slide and slide away the eternal summer days. 

It was a swift panorama of flower and sunlit wall 
and distant sea — the soft air rushing by. Now and 
then we would whirl past a carrier— a brown, bent 
man with one of those great sleds on his shoulders, 
toiling with it up the long, steep hill. They were 
marvellously picturesque, those carriers, but I wish 
they wouldn't do it. It takes some of the joy out of 
the slide to feel that somebody is going to carry your 
toboggan up the hill on his back. 

We shot out on the level at last, and started on a 

37 



The Ship -Dwellers 



little tour of the town. Laura and I wandered away 
alone, and stopped at little shops, and tried to trans- 
act business, and finally bought a clay water-jug for 
a hundred and twenty reis, which is to say sixpence, 
which is to say twelve cents. Money in Madeira is 




TWO MEN TAKE YOU IN HAND AND AWAY YOU GO 



calculated in reis, just as it is in the Azores, and the 
sound of the word suddenly recalled the visit of the 
Quaker City " Pilgrims" to those islands, and the 
memory of Blucher's disastrous dinner-party. 

But they will take anything that looks like money 

38 ' 



A Land of Heart's Desire 



in Madeira, rather than miss a trade, and when a per- 
son who has been accustomed to calculating dollars 
and cents is suddenly confronted with problems of 
reis and pence and shillings and half-crowns and 
francs, he goes to pieces on his money tables and 
wonders why a universal currency would not be a good 
thing. 

All the streets in Madeira have that dainty cobble 
paving, and all the sidewalks are laid in the exquisite 
mosaic which makes it a joy to follow them. The 
keynote of the island is invitation. Even a jail we 
saw is of a sort to make crime attractive. I hasten 
to' add that we examined only the outside. 

We were adopted by a guide presently — a boy 
whose only English was the statement that he could 
speak it — and were directed quietly but firmly toward 
places where things are sold. We tried to impress 
upon him in such languages as we could think of that 
we did not want to buy anything, and that we did not 
care much for a guide, anyway. We said we wanted 
to see bougainvillea — a lot of bougainvillea, in a great 
mass together, as we had seen it from the ship. He 
nodded excitedly and led us away, but it was only to 
a place where they sold embroideries which we did 
not care for, though they were cheap enough, dear 
knows, as everything is cheap here — everything native 
at least. 

When our guide grasped the fact at last that we 
did not want to do any buying, he became sad, weak- 
ened gradually, dropped behind, accepted a penny, 
and turned us over to another guide of the same sort. 
We wandered about Funchal in that way until it was 

39 



The Ship -Dwellers 



time to embark, adopted by one guide after another, 
and abandoned to our fate when they realized that 
we were not worth anything in the way of commissions 
from the merchants and very little in any form. We 
did get a guide at last who knew where the bougain- 
villea house was, but it was too late then to go to it. 
It did not matter; there were flowers enough every- 
where and bougainvillea on many walls. 

The place did not lose its charm with close acquaint- 
ance. It seemed entirely unspoiled. We saw no 
suggestion of modern architecture or European inno- 
vation — no blot anywhere, except a single motor-car 
— the only one, I believe, in Funchal. There is but 
one fly in the ointment of Madeira comfort — the beg- 
gars. They begin to beg before they can walk, and 
they call, " Penny! Penny!" before they can lisp the 
sacred name of "Mamma." However, one good 
thing has come of our experience with them. They 
have prepared us for beggars elsewhere. We are 
hardened, now — at least, we think we are. The 
savor of pity has gone out of us. 

But I was speaking of architecture. Without 
knowing anything on the subject, I should say that 
the architecture of Madeira is a mixture of Spanish 
and Moorish, like that of Mexico. Only it is better 
than anything in Mexico. From the ship, the stucco, 
tile-roofed city is flawless; and as we steam away, 
and night comes down and lights break out and 
become a jewelled necklace along the water's edge, 
our one regret is that we are leaving it all behind. 

Good-bye to Madeira — a gentle place, a lovely place 
— a place to live and die in. 

40 




DID A SORT OF FANDAROLE 



VII 

A DAY TO OURSELVES 

WE had another full day at sea, after Madeira — a 
day of reflection and reminiscence, for each 
of us had some special joy to recall. Perhaps that 
of the Diplomat was as picturesque as any. He told 
it to me privately, but a thing like that should not 
be allowed to remain concealed forever; besides, the 
young lady is in darkest Germany now and does not 
know English, anyway. That last-named fact was 
responsible for the incident. 

The Diplomat had just landed at the bottom of 
the slide, he said, when two of our party — Americans 
— came along with a bright-faced and quite stylish- 

4i 



The Ship -Dwellers 



looking German girl who was not having a very good 
time because they knew no German and she no Eng- 
lish. It was clearly a case for the Diplomat, who is 
an unattached person, full of the joy of travel and 
familiar with all languages, living and dead. 

He had not been presented to the young German 
person on the ship, but he had seen her now and again 
in company with an older, rather plain - looking 
woman, very likely her maid.. No doubt the young 
woman was a countess, or a baroness, or at all events 
a person of station and importance. Politely enough 
he proffered his services as escort, was accepted, and 
the two set out gayly to enjoy the halcyon Madeira 
afternoon. 

She was a most sociable companion, the Diplomat 
said, ready for anything that resembled a good time. 
They visited places of interest; they dropped into 
little shops; he bought flowers for her; they had 
refreshments here and there — dainty dishes and 
pleasant Madeira wines — keeping up, meantime, their 
merry German clatter. They became quite gay, in 
fact, and whenever they met any of the ship party, 
which they did frequently enough, the Diplomat, as 
he confessed to me, became rather vain and showy — 
set his hat on one side and did a sort of fandarole, 
accompanying his step with operatic German airs. 
At such moments she even took his hand and entered 
into the spirit of the occasion. 

Altogether it was a charming experience, and they 
were both sorry when it was time to return to the ship. 
Arriving there they were met by the older, plain- 
looking woman, who greeted his companion with 

42 



A Day to Ourselves 



words that were pleasant enough, gentle enough, but 
which partook of the nature of a command. Then 
it dawned upon the Diplomat; it was not the older, 
plain-looking woman who was the maid! 




THEN IT DAWNED UPON THE DIPLOMAT 



"I would have done it just the same," he explained 
to me in a dark corner of the deck, after dinner, "just 
the same, of course, being a gentleman, only under 
the circumstances I might have cut out the cakewalk 
and the music." 

A ship is a curious place altogether; a place of 

43 



The Ship -Dwellers 



narrow limits and close contact, yet full of subter- 
ranean depths from which surprises may develop at 
any moment. The Chief Engineer, to whom I sit 
next at meals, often quotes meditatively, 

"A ship it is a funny thing, 
It sails upon the sea — " 

The Chief does not recall the rest of the stanza, 
but we all admit the truth of what he does remember. 
Ship life on the whole is not like other life ; ship char- 
acteristics do not altogether resemble those on land. 

Take the " Porpoise," for instance. I have no 
doubt that the Porpoise on land is a most excellent 
and industrious business man, more or less absorbed 
in the daily round of his ventures — a happy-hearted 
contented Hebrew person, fairly quiet (it doesn't 
seem possible, but I am willing to believe it), on the 
whole a good citizen, satisfied if his name appears now 
and then in the local paper, when he gets in some new 
line of goods or makes an improvement on his home. 

But on shipboard the Porpoise is just — a porpoise. 
He is fat, as his name implies, and describes revolu- 
tions of the ship, blowing constantly. At no time 
of day and in no part of the ship will you be safe from 
the Porpoise. He is from an interior town — an 
unimportant town, by its census and location, but 
it has become important on this vessel. 

He has instructed us upon other subjects, too. 
Nothing is too complicated, or too deep, or too 
abstruse for the Porpoise. He will attack any ques- 
tion at sight, and he will puff and spout and describe 
circles and wallow in his oratory, and follow his 

44 



A Day to Ourselves 



audience about until he has swept the deck clean. 
Yet we love that Porpoise, in spite of everything. 
He is so happy and harmless and gentle. It is only 
because he is on a ship that he is a bore. 

Also, we love the "Mill." The Mill is a woman— 
a good woman — one of the kindliest souls on earth, 
I suspect, and her mouth is her warrant for her name. 
It goes all the time, but it does not deal with important 
things. Indeed, nothing is too unimportant for her 
hopper, and she grinds exceeding small. Just now, 
for an hour or so, she has been explaining that she 
did not sleep very well last night, and minutely 
cataloguing the reasons why. She will keep it up 
for another hour, and then if somebody hasn't dropped 
her overboard she will dig up something else of equal 
value and go right on, refreshed and rejoicing in the 
consciousness of well-doing. 

The Mill would not act this way at home — she 
would not have time. It is only because she is on a 
ship where everybody is idle and irresponsible and 
" different, " and likely to be peculiar. As Laura, 
age fourteen, said to me to-day — paraphrasing the 
words of the old Quaker spinster to her sister, "I 
think everybody on this ship is peculiar except thee 
and me, and sometimes I think thee is a little peculiar." 
That expresses the situation, and on the whole we 
enjoy it. We are like the little boy whose reputation 
for being a strange child did not interfere with his 
happiness. "Gee, ain't it great to be crazy!" was 
his favorite remark, and whatever we may be on this 
ship, we are content with the conditions, and would 
not change them, even if we could. 
4 45 



VIII 



OUT OF THE SUNRISE 

I HAVE seen the shores of Africa and Spain! The 
bath steward came very early, this morning — 
earlier than usual. He had his reasons, but I had 
forgotten and was sleepy, so I said ''No," and tried 
to doze again. Then all at once from the deck there 
arose a swell of music — rich, triumphant music — 
an orchestration of t "Holy, Holy, Holy"— such a 
strain as one might expect to hear if the eternal gates 
should swing ajar. I remembered, then ; it was Sunday 
morning — but there was something more. Land! 
The land that lies on the other side of the ocean! 

In a moment I was at my port-hole, which is on the 
starboard side. We had changed our course and were 
bearing more to the north. Directly in front of me 
the sun was rising. The east was a mass of glowing 
outlines — golden clouds and hilltops mingled. It was 
the Orient — that is what it was — the Far East ; the 
sun rising over Africa! Something got hold of me 
then — I hardly know what. Certainly I was not 
unhappy; but then it was all so sudden and spectac- 
ular, and I had waited for it so long. 

I do not remember how I got dressed; only for 
a moment at a time could I drag myself away from 
that port-hole. The sun rose higher — the outlines of 
Morocco became more distinct, but they did not lose 

46 



Out of the Sunrise 



their wonder of color — their glory of purple and gold. I 
realized now that the prospectuses had not exaggerated 
the splendor of the East, even on their gorgeous covers 
— that they could not do so if they tried. By the 
time I was on deck we were running close enough to 
the lofty shores to make out villages here and there 
and hilltop towers — the habitation and the watch- 
towers of the Moors. How eagerly and minutely 
one scanned these with the glass to distinguish the 
first sign of Oriental life — to get a glimpse of the 
reality of what had so long been but a romance and a 
dream. It was those people who had conquered 
Spain and built the Alhambra. 

What was going on inside those curious flat- 
topped houses and those towers ? Marvellous matters, 
no doubt, that had to do with nargileh and magic and 
scimiters and flying carpets and scarcely imperceptible 
nods to the executioner who always hovered among the 
draperies in the background. The Reprobates ap- 
peared and declared there was no romance anywhere 
in sight and never had been in that direction; that 
Morocco was just a place of wretched government 
and miserable people whose chief industries were lazi- 
ness and crime. There are moments when I would 
be willing for this ship to sink to properly punish 
the Reprobates. 

The Diplomat was better. He said there was as 
much romance and magic over there as ever, and more 
m executioners; and the Diplomat knows. We would 
pass Ceuta, the African Pillar of Hercules, before long, 
he told us. The other pillar was the Rock of Gibral- 
tar, which lay still farther ahead. 

47 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We went over to the other side of the ship presently, 
for we were overlooking the Bay of Trafalgar, where 
a little more than a hundred years ago Horatio Nelson 
died, after convincing the combined navies of France 
and Spain that it required something besides numbers 
to win a victory. Nelson went into that right with 
thirty-two vessels, little and big, against forty of the 
combined fleets. He hoisted the signal, " England 
expects every man to do his duty," and every man 
did it. One half of the combined fleets struck their 
colors, and the rest made off, or sank, and with them 
went Napoleon Bonaparte's scheme for invading 
England. 

We looked out on the placid water, laughing in 
the Sunday morning sunlight, and tried to imagine 
those vanished fleets — stately ships of the line with 
their banks of guns ; smart frigates and rakish cutters 
— all that splendid concourse of black hull and tower- 
ing canvas, and then the boom and the flash of guns — 
the conflict and the glory of that morning so long ago. 
This much was real, and it was romance; not even 
the Reprobates could brush away the bloom. 

The captain came by and pointed ahead to Tarifa, 
where the Barbary pirates a long time ago levied 
tribute on the merchants and added the word "tariff" 
to the dictionary. Their old castle has fallen into 
ruin, but the old industry still thrives, under the same 
name. Then we went back to starboard again for a 
look at Tangier, where, alas, we were not to land, 
because Algiers had been provided for us instead. 

But now Gibraltar, the crouching lion of Trafalgar, 
had risen from the sea. The English call it "The 

48 



Out of the Sunrise 



Rock," and that is just what it looks like — a big 
bowlder shaped like a sleeping lion — its head toward 
Spain, its tail toward Africa. I think most persons 
have an idea that the Rock lies lengthwise, east and 




BUT NOW GIBRALTAR, THE CROUCHING LION OF TRAFALGAR, 
HAD RISEN FROM THE SEA 

west — I know I thought so. Instead it lies north and 
south, and is really a stone finger pointed by Spain 
toward the African coast. It is Great Britain's pride 
— it has cost enough for her to be proud of it — and is 
her chief stronghold. 

About it are gathered her warships of to-day — 
dark, low-browed fighters like our own — any one of 
them able to send to the bottom a whole fleet like 
Nelson's and the combined fleets besides. They look 
quiet enough, ugly enough, and drowsy enough, now. 

49 



The Ship -Dwellers 



So does Gibraltar, but it is just as well, perhaps, 
not to twist the Lion's tail. We had no intention 
of doing so, and I don't see why they were so afraid 
of us. They wouldn't let us visit their shooting- 
galleries — the galleries where they keep their big 
guns, I mean; they wouldn't let us climb the Rock 
on the outside; they wouldn't even let us visit an 
old Moorish castle which stands about half-way up. 
Perhaps they thought we would spike their guns, or 
steal the castle, or blow up the Rock with infernal 
machines. 

They did let us^take carriages and drive along the 
main streets of the city, through a park or two and 
out to Europa Point, I think that was the place. We 
were interested, but not enthusiastic. After Madeira, 
one does not go mad over the beauties of Gibraltar. 
The vehicles were funny little affairs — Spanish, I 
suppose ; the driver spoke the English of Gibraltar — 
an English which nobody outside of Gibraltar, and 
only a few people there, can understand; the road 
was good; the flowers — bluebells, yellow daisies, dan- 
delions and heliotrope — all wild — were profuse and 
lavishly in bloom everywhere along the w T ay. Had we 
come direct to Gibraltar, we should have raved over 
these things like enough, and we did rave a little, but 
it was a sort of placid ecstasy. Military hospitals 
and barracks and officers' quarters are not the kind 
of scenery to excite this crowd. 

It was different, though, when we got to Europa 
Point. There, on one side rose the great Rock 
abruptly from the sea, while before us stretched the 
Mediterranean, all blue and emerald and iridescent, 

5o 



Out of the Sunrise 



like a great fire -opal in the sun. It was our first 
glimpse of the water along whose shores began the 
history and the religions of more than half the world. 
"The grand object of all travel is to see the shores of 
the Mediterranean," said Dr. Johnson, and there were 
some of us who not until that moment, I think, fully 
grasped the fact that this object, this dream of a 
lifetime, was about to be accomplished. 

The Patriarch forgot the Phoenicians for a little and 
began to talk about Athens and of Mars Hill from 
which St. Paul had preached, though he added present- 
ly that it was quite certain St. Paul's grandfather had 
been a Phoenician; the Diplomat quoted something 
about his soul being ' 1 far away sailing on the Vesuvian 
Bay"; the Porpoise began to meditate audibly how 
far it was in a straight line to Jerusalem; the Mill 
ground a quiet little grist about flannels she expected 
to wear in Egypt ; even the Reprobates were subdued 
and thoughtful in the face of this watery theatre that 
had held the drama of the ancient world. 

We drove back to the town, separated, and wan- 
dered about where fancy led us. Laura and I had a 
little business with the American consul, who is an 
example of what an American consul ought to be : a 
gentleman who is a consul by profession and not by 
party favor, being the third Sprague in line who has 
held the post. Through him we met a most interest- 
ing person, one who brought us in direct contact, as it 
were, with that old first party of Pilgrims to make 
the Oriental cruise. Michael Benunes was his name, 
guide and courier to Mark Twain and his party, forty- 
two years ago. 

5* 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Benunes must have been a handsome creature in 
those days; he is a handsome creature still — tall, 
finely featured, with flowing black hair — carrying 
his sixty-five years as lightly as wind-flowers — gay, 
voluble, enthusiastic — ready for the future, glorying 
in the past. He took us to a coffee-house and enter- 
tained us, and held us enthralled for an hour or more 
with his tide of eloquence and information. He told 
us of the trip he had made through Spain with the 
"Innocents"; of many other trips in lands near and 
far. He told us of the things in Gibraltar we had not 
seen — of the galleries and the monkey-pit; also, of 
the wonderful monkeys themselves who inhabit the 
Rock and are intelligent almost beyond belief — who 
refrain from speaking English only because they are 
afraid of having red coats and caps put on them and 
being made into soldiers. 

Gibraltar was once a part of Africa, according to 
tradition, and the monkeys remained on the Rock 
when the separation took place. But guides know 
that a subterranean passage from the bottomless 
monkey-pit connects the Rock with Africa to this 
day; also that the monkeys travel back and forth 
through it and keep posted on warfare and new 
inventions, in preparation for a time when they shall 
be ready to regain their lost empire, and that some- 
times at dusk, if one lies hidden and remains very 
quiet, he may overhear them discuss these things, 
as in the failing twilight they "walk together, holding 
each other's tails." 

We could have listened all night to Benunes, for he 
made the old time and still older traditions real to 

52 



Out of the Sunrise 



us. And perhaps Benunes would have talked all night, 
for he declared — and we believed him — that he could 
talk for five hours without a break. Naturally I 
expected to pay the score in the coffee-house and to 




WE COULD HAVE LISTENED ALL NIGHT TO BENUNES 



make some special acknowledgment to Benunes for 
his time. Not at all; he called the waiter with a 
flourish, threw down more than enough money and 
told him to keep the change, regretting volubly that 
we could not partake further of his hospitality. We 
should have the freedom of the city — of everything — 
he said, when we came again. Ah me! I suspect 
there is only one Benunes, and that he belongs to a 
time which will soon vanish away. 

53 



The Sh ip - Dwellers 



We went through the town — almost a closed tow T n, 
because it was Sunday, and not an inviting town, I 
think, at best. Here and there were narrow streets 
that wound up or down, yet were only mildly seduc- 
tive. But it is a cosmopolitan town — the most cosmo- 
politan town on earth, perhaps. Every kind of money 
is in use there — every language is spoken. 

' ' Picture postals twelve for a quarter!" was the 
American cry that greeted us at every turn. If we 
had been English it would have been "tw T elve for a 
shilling," or if German il zwdlf fur ein Mark'' no 
doubt. They do not mistake nationalities in Gibral- 
tar — they have all kinds to study from. Moors we 
saw — black, barelegged, and gayly attired — a taste 
of the Orient we were about to enter — and if there were 
any nationalities we did not see in this motley- 
thronged Mediterranean gateway I do not recall them 
now. We bought a few postal cards, and two fans 
with bull-fights on them, but unlike the Quaker City 
" Pilgrims " we bought no gloves. 

I did look at certain stylish young creatures who 
passed now and then, and wondered if one of them 
might not be the bewitching saleslady who had sold 
those gloves. And then I remembered: she would 
not be young and bewitching any more; she would 
be carrying the burden and the record of many years. 
Unlike the first "Pilgrims," too, we did not hear the 
story of the "Queen's Chair." That was worn out, 
at last, and exists to-day only in the guide-books. We 
drove over to Spanish Town by and by, but it was 
still less inviting over there, so we drove back, passed 
out through the great gates which close every evening 

54 



Out of the Sunrise 



at sunset, and waited at the pier for the little 
tender, for it was near evening and we were through 
with Gibraltar — ready for the comfort of the 
ship. 

It is a curious place — a place of a day's interest 
for the traveller — of enormous interest to the military 
world. For two hundred years it has been maintained 
with English blood and treasure, until it has become 
the most costly jewel of that lavish kingdom. There 
are those to-day — Englishmen — who say it is not 
worth the price — that it is no longer worth any price — 
and they advocate returning it to Spain. No army 
could take it, and no army wants to take it — nothing 
could be gained by taking it any more. But it is one 
of England's precious traditions, and it will take 
another two hundred years of vast maintenance be- 
fore England will let that tradition go. 

There were papers on the tender, London and Paris 
journals, but the only American news was that Con- 
gress had been advised against' tinkering with the 
tariff. That did not interest us. Had we not been 
face to face with the headquarters of tariff that very 
morning, and heard the story of how that noble 
industry was born? This later item was mere de- 
tail. 

Back on the ship, looking at the lion couchant 
while the twilight falls and the lights come out along 
its base. There is no harshness now. The lion's skin 
has become velvet — it is a veritable lion asleep among 
fireflies. We lift anchor and steam slowly into the 
Mediterranean. The lion loses its form, becomes a 
dark wedge, the thin edge toward Spain. Night 

55 



The Ship -Dwellers 



deepens as we creep farther around ; the wedge short- 
ens, contracts to a cone, a pyramid — the level sea 
changes to a desert. The feeling somehow grows 
that Africa has reclaimed its own — the Lion of Eng- 
land has become a pyramid of the sands. 



IX 



EARLY MEDITERRANEAN EXPERIENCES 

UR first day in the Mediterranean was without 



V_y a flaw. It was a quiet, sunlit day — just pleas- 
antly warm — the ship steady as a rock on that lumi- 
nous, level sea. No wonder the ancients did not want 
to leave these placid tides and venture out upon the 
dark tossing Atlantic which they could see foaming 
just beyond the Pillars of Hercules. No wonder they 
peopled those hungry wastes with monsters and evil 
spirits. Here, on this tranquil sea, there were no un- 
familiar dangers. The summer shores that shut them 
in held all their world — a golden world of romance 
wherein gods mingled with the affairs of men ; where 
fauns and hamadryads flitted through the groves; 
where nereids and tritons sported along the waves. 

We have all day and night to get to Algiers — now 
less than three hundred miles away — so we are just 
loafing along making wide circles — "to test the com- 
pass," one of the officers said a while ago. I did not 
know they had to test compasses, and I'm rather 
doubtful about the matter, still. I suspect that 
officer is enjoying himself quietly at our expense. I 
suspect it, because he is the same officer who told the 
Credulous One the other day when the ship was rolling 
heavily, that the jarring, beating sound we heard 
every now and then was made by the ship running 




57 



The Ship -Dwellers 



over whales. The noise was really made by the 
screw lifting out of the water, and pounding the 
surface with its blades, but the Credulous One, who 
is a trusting soul — a stout lady of middle age and 
gentle spirit — believed the whale story and repeated 
it around the ship. She said how many whales there 
must be down here, and pitied them whenever she 
heard that cruel sound. 

That officer came along again, a moment ago, and 
told us that the mountains nearest are called the Sierra 
de Gata, which sounds true. Somewhere beyond them 
lies Grenada and the Alhambra, and there, too, is 
the old, old city of Cordova, capital of the Moorish 
kings, and for three hundred years one of the greatest 
centres of commerce in the world. But these things 
are only history. What we care for on a day like 
this is invention — romance — and remembering that 
somewhere beyond that snowy rim Don Quixote and 
Sancho wandered through the fields of fancy and the 
woods of dream makes us wish that we might anchor 
along those shores and follow that vagrant quest. 

I drifted into the smoking-room and mentioned 
these things to the Reprobates, but they did not seem 
interested. They had the place all to themselves and 
the Doctor was dozing in one corner — between naps 
administering philosophy to the Colonel and the Apos- 
tle, who were engaged in their everlasting game of 
piquet. He roused up when I came in to deal out a 
few comforting remarks. 

"What do they care for scenery, or romance," he 
said, "or anything else except to gamble all day? 
All you've got to do is to look at them to get an 

58 



Early Mediterranean Experiences 



inventory of their characters. Just look at the Colonel 
for instance; did you ever see a better picture of 
Captain Kidd ? Made his money out of publishing the 
Bible without reading it and thinks he must go to the 
Holy Land now to square himself. And the Apostle, 
there — look at him! Look at his shape — why, he's 
likely to blow up, any time. Some people think these 
are patients of mine. Nice advertisement, a pair 
like that!" 

I thought the Doctor a trifle hard on his fellow- 
Reprobates. I thought the Colonel rather handsome, 
and I had seen him studying his guide-book more 
than once. As for the Apostle, I said that I never 
really felt that he was about to blow up ; that appear- 
ances were often deceitful and very likely there was 
no immediate danger. 

They were not inclined to be sociable — the Colonel 
and the Apostle. They merely intimated that we 
might go away, preferably to a place not down on the 
ship's itinerary, and kept on with their eternal game. 

It is curious, the fascination of that game, piquet — 
still more curious how anybody can ever learn to 
play it. In fact nobody ever does learn it. There 
are no rules — no discoverable rules. It is purely 
an inspirational game, if one may judge from this ex- 
hibition of it. After the cards are dealt out, the 
Colonel picks up his hand, jerks his hat a little lower 
over his eyes, skins through his assortment, and says 
"Huh!" At the same time the Apostle puts on 
his holiest look — chin up, eye drooped, bland and 
childlike — examines his collection, and says, "God- 
dlemighty!" 

59 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Then they play — that is, they go through the 
motions. The Colonel puts down a handful of cards 
and says ''Eight." The Apostle never looks at them, 
but puts down a bigger handful of his own and says 
"Eleven." Then the Colonel puts down another lot 
and says "Fourteen." Then the Apostle lays down 
the balance of his stock and the Colonel says, "Hell, 
Joe," and they set down some figures. When they 
are through, the Colonel owes the Apostle seven 
dollars. 

Yes, it is a curious game, and would make the 
Colonel a pauper in time, if nature did not provide 
other means of adjustment. After the Apostle has 
his winnings comfortably put away and settled into 
place, the Colonel takes out a new five-dollar gold 
piece, regards it thoughtfully, turns it over, reads the 
date, and comments on its beauty. Then suddenly 
he slaps it down on the table under his hand. 

"Match you, Joe," he says, "match you for five!" 

But the Apostle is wary. He smiles benignly while 
he turns his face from temptation. 

"No you don't," he says, "never again." 

The Colonel slaps the coin down again, quite 
smartly. 

"Just once, Joe," he wheedles; "just once, for 
luck!" 

The Apostle strokes his chubby, child-like counte- 
nance with the tips of his fingers, still looking away — 
his eyes turned heavenward. 

"I won't do it, I tell you. No, now go on away. I 
told you yesterday I wouldn't match you again — 
ever." 

60 



Early Mediterranean Experiences 



"Just once, Joe — just this one time." 
"I won't do it." 

The Apostle's attitude is still resolute, but there is 
a note of weakening in his voice and his hand is work- 
ing almost imperceptibly toward his pocket. 

"Just once more, Joe, just for five dollars — one 
turn." 

The Apostle's hand is in his pocket. 

"Now, I tell you," he says, "I'll match you this 
one time, and never again." 

"All right, Joe, just this one time, for luck; come 
on, now." 

The coins go down together, and when they are 
uncovered the Colonel takes both, always. Then the 
Apostle jerks up his cap, jams it on, and starts for the 
deck. 

"Hold on, Joe; just once more — just for luck." 
"You go to hell, will you ?" 

This is the programme daily with but slight varia- 
tion. Sometimes the Apostle wins less than seven 
dollars — sometimes he loses more than five; but he 
always does win at piquet and he always does lose at 
matching. Thus do the unseen forces preserve the 
balance of exchange. 

We crossed over and came in sight of the mountains 
of Algeria during the afternoon, and all the rest of 
this halcyon day we skirted the African shore, while 
Laura and I and two other juveniles kept a game 
of shuffleboard going on the after deck. To-night 
there is to be another grand dinner and dance, in 
honor of Washington's Birthday. We shall awake 
to-morrow in the harbor of Algiers. 
5 61 



X 



THE DIVERTING STORY OF ALGIERS 

THIS is a voyage of happy mornings. It was 
morning — just sunrise — when we met the Ameri- 
can fleet homeward bound; it was morning when we 
caught the first glimpse of Madeira and steamed into 
the harbor of Funchal; the shores of Morocco — our 
first glimpse of the Orient — came out of the sunrise, 
and it was just sunrise this morning when I looked 
out of my port-hole on the blue harbor and terraced 
architecture of Algiers. And the harbor of Algiers is 
blue, and the terraced architecture is white, or creamy, 
and behind it are the hills of vivid green. And there 
are palms and cypress-trees, and bougainvillea and 
other climbing vines. Viewed from the ship it is a 
picture city, and framed in the port-hole it became a 
landscape miniature of wondrous radiance and vivid 
hues. 

One of our passengers, a happy-hearted, elderly 
Hebrew soul, came along the promenade just outside 
my state-room and surveyed the vision through his 
glass. Presently he was joined by his comfortable, 
good-natured wife. 

4 'Vat you get me up so early for, Sol?" she said. 

He handed her his glass, his whole face alive with 
joy of the moment — fairly radiant it was. 

' ' I yust couldn't help it ! " he said. ' ' Dot sunrising 

62 



The Diverting Story of Algiers 



and dot harbor and dot city all make such a beautiful 
sight." 

A beautiful sight it was, and it had the added charm 
of being our first near approach to the Orient. For 
Algiers is still the Orient, though it has been a French 
colony for nearly a hundred years. The Orient and 
the Occident have met here, and the Occident has 
conquered, but the Orient is the Orient still, and will 
be so long as a vestige of it remains. 

The story of Algiers, like that of every Mediterra- 
nean country, has been a motley one, and bloody 
enough, of course. The Romans held it for nearly 
five hundred years; the Vandals followed them, and 
these in turn were ousted by the Arabs, about the 
year 700 a.d. Blood flowed during each of these 
changes, and betweentimes. There was always blood 
— rivers of it — lakes of it — this harbor has been red 
with it time and again. 

It did not stop flowing with the Arabian conquest — 
not by any means. Those Arabs were barbarians 
and robbers — Bedouins on land and pirates on the 
sea. They were the friends of no nation or people, 
and when business was dull outside, they would 
break out among themselves and indulge in pillage 
and slaughter at home for mere pastime. About the 
time Columbus was discovering America they were 
joined by the Moors and Jews who were being driven 
out of Spain and who decided to take up piracy as 
a regular business. 

Piratic industry, combined with slavery, flourished 
for a matter of four centuries after that; then Com- 
modore Decatur with a handful of little vessels met 

63 



The Ship -Dwellers 



the Algerian fleet off Carthagena on the 20th of 
June, 181 5. Decatur was a good hand with pirates. 
He went to work on that fleet and when he got through 
there wasn't enough of it left to capture a banana- 
boat. Then he appeared before Algiers and sent a 
note to the Dey demanding the immediate release 
of all Americans in slavery. The Dey replied that 
as a mere matter of form he hoped the American com- 
mander would agree to sending a small annual tribute 
of powder. 

"If you take the powder you must take the balls 
with it," was Decatur's reply, and thus the young 
American republic, then only about thirty years old, 
was first to break down the monstrous institutions 
of piracy and enslavement which for more than a 
thousand years had furnished Algerian revenues. 

One Hussein (history does not mention his other 
name, but it was probably Ali Ben) was the last Dey 
of Algiers, and his memory is not a credit to his 
country's story. He was cruel and insolent; also, 
careless in his statements. 

Piracy under A. B. Hussein flourished with a good 
deal of its old vigor, though I believe he was rather 
careful about plundering American vessels. Hussein 
was also a usurer and the principal creditor of some 
Jewish merchants who had a claim against France. 
The claim was in litigation, and Hussein, becoming 
impatient, demanded payment from the French king. 
As France had been the principal sufferer from Hus- 
sein's pirates, it was not likely that the king would 
notice this demand. Soon after, in the Dey's palace, 
the Kasba, at a court function the Dey asked of 

64 



The Diverting Story of Algiers 



the French consul why his master had remained 
silent. 

"The King of France does not correspond with the 
Dey of Algiers," was the haughty reply, whereupon 
Hussein struck the consul on the cheek with his fan, 
and said a lot of unpleasant things of both king and 
consul. 

That was the downfall of Algiers. A blockade 
was established by the French, and three years later 
the French army of invasion marched in. Fifteen 
hundred guns, seventeen ships of war, and fifty million 
francs fell into the hands of France, as spoil of war. 
Algiers was no longer the terror of the seas. Over 
six hundred thousand Christian people had suffered 
the horrors of Algerian bondage, but with that July 
day, 1830, came the end of this barbarism, since 
which time Algiers has acquired a new habit — the 
habit of jumping at the crack of the French whip. 

I may say here in passing that we were to hear a 
good deal of that incident of the Dey, the French 
consul, and the fan. It was in the guide-books in 
various forms, and as soon as I got dressed and on 
deck one of our conductors — himself a former resi- 
dent of Algiers — approached me with: 

"Do you see that tower up there on the hill-top? 
That is the Kasba. It was in that tower that Hussein, 
the last Dey of Algiers, struck the French consul 
three times on the cheek with his fan — an act which 
led to the conquest of Algiers by France." 

I looked at the tower with greatly renewed interest, 
and brought it up close to me with my glass. Then 
he pointed out other features of the city, fair and 

65 



The Ship -Dwellers 




" THAT IS THE KASBA " 



beautiful in the light of morning: the mosque; the 
governor's palace;- the Arab quarter; the villas of 
wealthy Alger ines. He drifted away, then, and the 
Diplomat approached. He also had been in Algiers 
once before. He said: 

"Do you see that tower there on the hill -top? 

66 



The Diverting Story of Algiers 



That is the Kasba. It was in that tower that Hussein, 
the last Dey of Algiers, struck the French consul 
three times on the cheek with his fan — an act which 
led to the conquest of Algiers by France." 

He went away, and I looked over the ship's side 
at the piratical-looking boatmen who were gathering 
to the attack. They were a picturesque lot — their 
costumes purely Oriental — their bare feet encased in 
shoes right out of the Arabian Nights pictures. I was 
just turning to remark these things to one of the 
Reprobates, the Colonel, when he said: 

' 1 Do you see that tower up there on the hill-top ? ' ' 

''Colonel," I said, "you've been reading your guide- 
book, and I saw you the other day with a book 
called Innocents Abroad.'' 

He looked a little dazed. 

"Well," he said, "what of it?" 

"Nothing; only that tower seems to be another 
' Queen's Chair.' I've been to it several times in the 
guide-book myself, and I've already had it twice 
served up by hand. Let's don't talk about it any 
more, until we've been ashore and had a look at it." 




ONE DOES NOT HURRY THE ORIENT ONE WAITS ON IT 



XI 

WE ENTER THE ORIENT 

WE went ashore, in boats to the dock, then we 
stepped over some things, and under some 
things and walked through the custom-house (they 
don't seem to bother us at these places) and there 
were our carriages (very grand carriages — quite 
different from the little cramped jiggle-wagons of Gib- 
raltar) all drawn up and waiting. And forthwith we 
found ourselves in the midst of the Orient and the 
Occident — a busy, multitudinous life, pressing about 
us, crowding up to our carriages to sell us postal cards 
and gaudy trinkets, babbling away in mongrel French 
and other motley and confused tongues. 

What a grand exhibition it was to us who had come 
up out of the Western Ocean, only half believing that 

68 



We Enter the Orient 



such scenes as this — throngs of sun-baked people in 
fantastic dress — could still exist anywhere in the 
world ! We were willing to sit there and look at them, 
and I kept my camera going feverishly, being filled 
with a sort of fear, I suppose, that there were no 
other such pictures on earth and I must catch them 
now or never. 

We were willing to linger, but not too long. We 
got our first lesson in Oriental deliberation right there. 
Guides had been arranged for and we must wait for 
them before we could start the procession. They did 
not come promptly. Nothing comes promptly in the 
Orient. One does not hurry the Orient — one waits on 
it. That is a maxim I struck out on the anvil, white- 
hot, that first hour in Algiers, and I am satisfied it is not 
subject to change. The sun poured down on us ; the 
turbaned, burnoused, barefooted selling-men rallied 
more vociferously; the Reprobates invented new 
forms of profanity to fit Eastern conditions, and still 
the guides did not come. 

We watched some workmen storing grain in ware- 
, houses built under the fine esplanade that flanks the 
water-front, and the picture they made consoled us 
for a time. They were Arabs of one tribe or another 
and they wore a motley dress. All had some kind of 
what seemed cumbersome head-gear — a turban or a 
folded shawl, or perhaps an old gunny-sack made into 
a sort of hood with a long cape that draped down 
behind. A few of them had on thick European coats 
over their other paraphernalia. 

We wondered why they should dress in this volu- 
minous* fashion in such a climate, and then we decided 

69 



The Ship -Dwellers 



that the wisdom of the East had prompted the pro- 
tection of that head-gear and general assortment of 
wardrobe against the blazing sun. Our guides came 
drifting in by and by, wholly unexcited and only 
dreamily interested in our presence, and the pro- 
cession moved. Then we ascended to the streets 
above — beautiful streets, and if it were not for the 
Oriental costumes and faces everywhere we might 
have been in France. 

French soldiers were discoverable all about ; French 
groups were chatting and drinking coffee and other 
beverages at open-air cafes; fine French equipages 
rolled by with ladies and gentlemen in fashionable 
French dress. Being carnival-time, the streets were 
decorated with banners and festoons in the French 
colors. But for the intermixture of fezzes and turbans 
and the long-flowing garments of the East we would 
have said, "After all, this is not the Orient, it is 
France." 

But French Algiers, "gay, beautiful, and modern 
as Paris itself" (the guide-book expression), is, after 
all, only the outer bulwark, or rather the ornate frame 
of the picture it encloses. That picture when you are 
fairly in the heart of it is as purely Oriental I believe 
as anything in the world to-day, and cannot have 
changed much since Mohammedanism came into 
power there a thousand years ago. But I am getting 
ahead too fast. We did not penetrate the heart of 
Algiers at once — only the outer edges. 

We drove to our first mosque— a typical white- 
domed affair, plastered on the outside, and we fought 
our way through the beggars who got in front of us 

70 



We Enter the Orient 



and behind us and about us, demanding " sou-penny 
at least it sounded like that — a sort of French-English 
combination, I suppose, which probably has been 
found to work well enough to warrant its general 
adoption. 

We thought we had seen beggars at Madeira, and 
had become hardened to them. We had become 
hardened toward the beggars, but not to our own 
sufferings. One can only stand about so much 
punishment — then he surrenders. It is easier and 
quicker to give a sou-penny, or a dozen of them, than 
it is to be bedevilled and besmirched and bewildered 
by these tatterdemalion Arabs who grab and cling 
and obstruct until one doesn't know whether he is 
in Algiers or Altoona, and wishes only to find relief 
and sanctuary. Evidently sight-seeing in the East 
has not become less strenuous since the days when the 
"Innocents" made their pilgrimage in these waters. 

We found temporary sanctuary in the mosque, 
but it was not such as one would wish to adopt 
permanently. It was a bare, unkempt place, and 
they made us put on very objectionable slippers 
before we could step on their sacred carpets. This 
is the first mosque we have seen, so of course I am 
not a purist in the matter of mosques yet, but I am 
wondering if it takes dirt and tatters to make a rug 
sacred, and if half a dozen mangy, hungry-looking 
Arab priests inspire the regular attendants in a place 
like that with religious fervor. 

They inspired me only with a desire to get back 
to the beggars, where I could pay sou-pennies for 
the privilege of looking at the variegated humanity 

7i 



The Ship - Dwellers 



and of breathing the open air. The guide-book says 
this is a poor mosque, but that is gratuitous infor- 
mation; I could have told that myself as soon as 
I looked at it. Anybody could. 

We went through some markets after that, and 
saw some new kinds of flowers and fruit and fish, 
but they did not matter. I knew there were better 
things than these in Algiers, and I was impatient to 
get to them. I begrudged the time, too, that we 
put in on some public buildings, though a down-town 
palace of AH Ben Hussein, the final Dey of Algiers 
— a gaudy wedding-cake affair, all fluting and frost- 




T.f«.*<\1-f 



MARVELLOUS BASKETS AND QUEER 
THINGS 

ing — was not without interest, especially when we 
found that the late Hussein had kept his seven wives 
there. It was a comparatively old building, built in 

72 



We Enter the Orient 



Barbarossa times, the guide said, and now used only 
on certain official occasions. It is not in good taste, 
I imagine, even from the Oriental standpoint. 

But what we wanted, some of us at least, was to 
get out of these show-places and into the shops — the 
native shops that we could see stretching down the 
little side-streets. We could discover perfectly marvel- 
lous baskets and jugs and queer things of every sort 
fairly stuffing these little native selling-places, and 
there were always fascinating groups in those side- 
streets, besides men with big copper water-jars on 
their shoulders that looked a thousand years old — 
the jars, I mean — all battered and dented and polished 
by the mutations of the passing years. 

I wanted one of those jars. I would have given 
more for one of those jars than for the mosque, in- 
cluding all the sacred rugs and the holy men, or for 
the palace of A. B. Hussein, and Hussein himself, 
with his seven wives thrown in for good measure. 
No, I withdraw that last item. I would not make a 
quick decision like that in the matter of the wives. 
I would like to look them over first. But, dear me, I 
forgot — they have been dead a long, long time, so 
let the offer stand. That is to say, I did want the 
jar and I was willing to do without the other things. 
There was no good opportunity for investment just 
then, and when I discussed the situation with Laura, 
who was in the carriage with me, she did not encourage 
any side-adventures. She was right, I suppose, for we 
were mostly on the move. We went clattering away 
through some pleasing parks, presently, and our drivers, 
who were French, cracked their whips at the Algerine 

73 



The Ship -Dwellers 



rabble and would have run them down, I believe, 
with great willingness, and could have done so, 
perhaps, without fear of penalty. Certainly French 
soldiers are immune to retribution in Algiers. We saw 
evidence of that, and I would have resented their 
conduct more, if I had not remembered those days 
not so long ago of piracy and bondage, and realized 




WE DID NOT CARE MUCH FOR PARKS 



that these same people might be murdering and en- 
slaving yet but for the ever-ready whip of France. 

From one of the parks we saw above us an old, 
ruined, vine-covered citadel. Could we go up there ? 
we asked ; we did not care much for parks. Yes, we 
could go up there — all in good time. One does not 

74 



We Enter the Orient 



hurry the Orient — one waits on it. We did go up 
there, all in good time, and then we found it was the 
Kasba, the same where had occurred the incident 
which had brought about the fall of Algiers. 

They did not show us the room where that historic 
spark had been kindled, but they did tell us the story 
again, and they showed us a view of the city and the 
harbor and the Atlas Mountains with snow on them, 
•and one of our party asked if those mountains were 
in Spain. I would have been willing to watch that 
view for the rest of the day had we had time. We did 
not have time. We were to lunch somewhere by 
and by, and meantime we were to go through the 
very heart, the very heart of hearts, of Algiers. 

That is to say, the Arab quarter — the inner circle of 
circles where, so far as discoverable, French domination 
has not yet laid its hand. We left the carriages at a 
point somewhere below the Kasba, passed through an 
arch in a dead w r all — an opening so low that the 
tallest of us had to stoop (it was a ' 'needle's eye," 
no doubt) — and there we were. At one step we had 
come from a mingling of East and West to that which 
was eternally East with no hint or suggestion of 
contact with any outside world. 

I should say the streets would average six to eight 
feet wide, all leading down hill. They were winding 
streets, some of them dim, and each a succession of 
stone steps and grades that meander down and down 
into a stranger labyrinth of life than I had ever 
dreamed of. 

How weak any attempt to tell of that life seems! 
The plastered, blind-eyed houses with their mysterious 

75 



The Ship -Dwellers 




ETERNALLY EAST WITH NO HINT OF 
THE OUTSIDE WORLD 



Everywhere was humanity 
to the East — had always belonged there 

76 



entrances and narrow dusky 
stairways leading to what dark 
and sinister occupancy; the 
narrow streets bending off here 
and there that one might fol- 
low, who could say whither; 
the silent, drowsing, strangely 
garbed humanity that regard- 
ed us only with a vague scorn- 
ful interest and did not even 
offer to beg ; the low dim 
coffee-houses before 
which men sat drink- 
ing and contemplat- 
ing — so inattentive to 
the moment's event 
that one might be- 
lieve they had sat 
always thus, sipping 
and contemplating, 
and would so sit 
through time — how 
can I convey to the 
reader even a faint 
reflection of that un- 
real, half -awake world 
or conjure again the 
spell which, beholding 
it for the first time, 
one is bound to feel? 
which belonged only 
had re- 



We Enter the Orient 



mained unchanged in feature and dress and mode of 
life since the beginning. The prophets looked and 
dressed just as these people look and dress, and their 
cities were as this city, built into steep hillsides, with 
streets a few feet wide, shops six feet square or less, 
the dreaming shopkeeper in easy reach of every 
article of his paltry trade. 

I do not think it is a very clean place. Of course 
the matter of being clean is more or less a comparative 
condition, and what one nation or one family con- 
siders clean another nation or family might not be 
satisfied with at all. But judged by any standards 
I have happened to meet heretofore I should say the 
Arab quarter of Algiers was not overclean. 

But it was picturesque. In whatever direction you 
looked was a picture. It was like nature untouched 
by civilization — it could not be unpicturesque if it 
tried. It was, in fact, just that — nature unspoiled 
by what we choose to call civilization because it 
means bustle, responsibility, office hours, and, now 
and then, clean clothes. And being nature, even the 
dirt was not unbeautiful. 

Somebody has defined dirt as matter out of place. 
It was not out of place here. Nor rags. Some of 
these creatures were literally a mass of rags — rag upon 
rag — sewed on, tacked on, tied on, hung on — but 
they were fascinating. What is the use trying to con- 
vey all the marvel of it in words ? One must see for 
himself to realize, and even then he will believe he 
has been dreaming as soon as he turns away. 

In a little recess, about half-way down the hill, 
heeding nothing — wholly lost in reverie it would seem 
6 77 



The Ship -Dwellers 



— sat two venerable, turbaned men. They had long 
beards and their faces were fine and dignified. These 
were holy men, the guides told us, and very sacred. 
I did not understand just why they were holy — a 
mere trip to Mecca would hardly have made them as 
holy as that, I should think — and nobody seemed to 
know the answer when I asked about it. Then I asked 
if I might photograph them, but 1 could see by the 
way our guide grabbed at something firm to sustain 
himself that it would be just as well not to press the 
suggestion. 

I was not entirely subdued, however, and pretty 
soon hunted up further trouble. A boy came along 
with one of the copper water- jars — a small one — 
probably children's size. I made a dive for him and 
proposed buying it; that is, I held out money and 
reached for the jar. He probably thought I wanted 
a drink, and handed it to me, little suspecting my 
base design. But when he saw me admiring the jar 
itself and discussing it with Laura, who was waiting 
rather impatiently while our party was drifting away, 
he reached for it himself, and my money did not seem 
to impress him. 

Now I suspect that those jars are not for sale. 
This one had a sort of brass seal with a number and 
certain cryptic words on it which would suggest some 
kind of record. As likely as not those jars are all 
licensed, and for that boy to have parted with his 
would have landed us both in a donjon keep. I don't 
know in the least what a donjon keep is, but it sounds 
like a place to put people for a good while, and I 
had no time then for experimental knowledge. Our 

78 



We Enter the Orient 



friends had already turned a corner when we started 
on and we hurried to catch up, not knowing whether 
or not we should ever find them again. 

We came upon them at last peering into an Arab 
school. The teacher, who wore a turban, sat cross- 
legged on a raised dais, and the boys, who wore fezzes 
— there were no girls — were grouped on either side — 
on a rug — their pointed shoes standing in a row 
along the floor. They were reciting in a chorus from 
some large cards — the Koran, according to the guide 
— and it made a queer clatter. 

It must have struck their dinner-hour, just then, 
for suddenly they all rose, and each in turn made an 
obeisance to the teacher, kissed his hand, slipped on a 
pair of little pointed shoes and swarmed out just as 
any school-boy in any land might do. Only they 
were not so noisy or impudent. They were rather 
grave, and their curiosity concerning us was not of a 
frantic kind. They were training for the life of con- 
templation, no doubt; perhaps even to be holy men. 

We passed little recesses where artizans of all kinds 
were at work with crude implements on what seemed 
unimportant things. We passed a cubby-hole where 
a man was writing letters in the curious Arabic 
characters for men who squatted about and waited 
their turn. We saw the pettiest merchants in the 
world — men with half a dozen little heaps of fruit and 
vegetables on the ground, not more than three or four 
poor-looking items in each heap. In a land where 
fruit and vegetables are the most plentiful of all 
products, a whole stock in trade like that could not 
be worth above three or four cents. I wonder what 

79 



The Ship -Dwellers 



sort of a change they make when they sell only a part 
of one of those pitiful heaps. 

We were at the foot of the hill and out of that 
delightful Arab quarter all too soon. But we could 
not stay. Our carriages were waiting there, and we 
were in and off and going gaily through very beautiful 
streets to reach the hotel where we were to lunch. 

Neither shall I dwell on the governor's palace which 
we visited, though it is set in a fair garden; nor on 
the museum, with the exception of just one thing. 
That one item is, I believe, unique in the world's list 
of curiosities. It is a plaster cast of the martyr 
Geronimo in the agony of death. The Alger ines put 
Geronimo alive into a soft mass of concrete which 
presently hardened into a block, and was built into 
a fort. This was in 1569, and about forty years later 
a Spanish writer described the event and told exactly 
how that particular block could be located. 

The fort stood for nearly three hundred years. 
Then in 1853 it was torn down, the block was identified 
and broken open, and an almost perfect mould of the 
dead martyr was found within. They filled the mould 
with plaster, and the result — a wonderful cast — lies 
there in the museum to-day, his face down as he died, 
hands and feet bound and straining, head twisted to 
one side in the supreme torture of that terrible mar- 
tyrdom. It is a gruesome, fascinating thing, and you 
go back to look at it more than once, and you slip 
out betweentimes for a breath of fresh air. 

Remembering the story and looking at that strain- 
ing figure, you realize a little of the need he must 
have known, and your lungs contract and you smother 

80 



We Enter the Orient 



and hurry out to the sky and sun and God-given 
oxygen of life. He could not have lived long, but 
every second of consciousness must have been an 
eternity of horror, for there is no such thing as time 
except as to mode of measurement, and a measurement 
such as that would compass ages unthinkable. If I 
lived in Algiers and at any time should sprout a little 
bud of discontent with the present state of affairs — a 
little sympathy with the subjugated population — I 
would go and take a look at Geronimo, and forthwith 
all the discontent and the sympathy would pass away, 
and I would come out gloating in the fact that France 
can crack the whip and that we of the West can ride 
them down. 

We drove through the suburbs, the most beautiful 
suburbs I have ever seen in any country, and here and 
there beggars sprang up by the roadside and pursued 
us up hill and down, though we were going helter- 
skelter with fine horses over perfect roads. How 
these children could keep up with us I shall never 
know, or how a girl of not more than ten could 
carry a big baby and run full speed down hill, crying 
out "Son-penny" at every step, never stumbling or 
falling behind. Of course, nobody could stand that. 
We flung her sou -pennies and she gathered them up 
like lightning and was after the rear carriages, un- 
satisfied and unabated in speed. 

We passed a little lake with two frogs in it. They 
called to us, but they spoke only French or Algerian, 
so we did not catch the point of their remarks. 

And now we drove home — that is, back to the fine 
streets near the water-front where we were to leave 

81 



The Ship -Dwellers 



the carriages and wander about for a while, at will. 
That was a wild, splendid drive. We were all princi- 
pals in a gorgeous procession that went dashing down 
boulevards and through villages, our drivers cracking 
their whips at the scattering people who woke up 
long enough to make a fairly spry dash for safety. 

Oh, but it was grand! The open barouches, the 
racing teams, the cracking whips! Let the Arab 
horde have a care. They sank unoffending vessels; 
they reddened the sea with blood; they enslaved 
thousands ; they martyred Geronimo. Let the whips 
crack — drive us fast over them ! 

Still, I wasn't quite so savage as I sound. I didn't 
really wish to damage any of those Orientals. I only 
wanted to feel that I could do it and not have to pay 
a fine — not a big fine — and I invented the idea of 
taking a lot of those cheap Arabs to America for 
automobilists to use up, and save money. 

When we got back to town, while the others were 
nosing about the shops, I slipped away and went up 
into the Arab quarter again, alone. It was toward 
evening now, and it was twilight in there, and there 
was such a lot of humanity among which I could not 
see a single European face or dress. I realized that 
I was absolutely alone in that weird place and that 
these people had no love for the "Christian Dog." 

I do not think I was afraid, but I thought of these 
things, and wondered how many years would be likely 
to pass before anybody would get a trace of what 
had become of me, if anything did become of me, and 
what that thing would be likely to be. Something 
free and handsome, no doubt — something with hot 

82 



We Enter the Orient 



skewers and boiling oil in it, or perhaps soft con- 
crete. 

Still, I couldn't decide to turn back, not yet. If 
the place had been interesting by daylight, it was 
doubly so, now, in the dusk, with the noiseless, hooded 
figures slipping by; the silent coffee-drinkers in the 
half gloom — leaning over now and then, to whisper 
a little gossip, maybe, but usually abstracted, in- 
different. What could they ever have to gossip about 
anyway? They had no affairs. Their affairs all 
ended long ago. 

I came to an open place by and by, a tiny square 
which proved to be a kind of second-hand market- 
place. I altered all my standards of economy there 
in a few minutes. They were selling things that the 
poorest family of the East Side of New York would 
pitch into the garbage-barrel. Broken bottles, tin 
cans, wretched bits of clothing, cracked clay water- 
jars that only cost a few cents new. I had bought 
a new one myself as I came along for eight cents. 
I began to feel a deep regret that I had not waited. 

Adjoining the market was a gaming-place and coffee- 
house combined. Men squatting on the ground in 
the dusk played dominoes and chess wordlessly, never 
looking up, only sipping their coffee now and then, 
wholly indifferent to time and change and death and 
the hereafter. I could have watched them longer, 
but it would really be dark presently, and one must 
reach the ship by a certain hour. One could hardly 
get lost in the Arab quarter, for any downhill stair 
takes you toward the sea, but I did not know by which 
I had come, so I took the first one and started down. 

83 



The Ship -Dwellers 



I walked pretty rapidly, and I looked over my 
shoulder now and then, because — well, never mind, 
I looked over my shoulder — and I would have been 
glad to see anything that looked like a Christian. 
Presently I felt that somebody was following me. I 
took a casual look and made up my mind that it was 
true. There were quantities of smoking, drinking 
people all about, but I didn't feel any safer for that. 
I stepped aside presently and stood still to let him 
pass. He did pass — a sinister looking Arab — but 
when I started on he stepped aside too, and got 
behind me again. 

So I stopped and let him pass once more, and then 
it wasn't necessary to manoeuvre again, for a few 
yards ahead the narrow Arab defile flowed into the 
lighter French thoroughfare. He was only a pick- 
pocket, perhaps — there are said to be a good many in 
Algiers — but he was not a pleasant-looking person, 
and I did not care to cultivate him at nightfall in 
that dim, time-forgotten place. 

I picked up some friends in the French quarter, 
and Laura and I drifted toward the ship, pressed by 
a gay crowd of merry-makers. It was carnival- time, 
as before mentioned, and the air was full of confetti, 
and the open-air cafes were crowded with persons 
of both sexes and every nation, drinking, smoking, 
and chattering, the air reeking with tobacco and the 
fumes of absinthe. Everywhere were the red and 
blue soldiers of France — Chasseurs d'Afrique and 
Zouaves — everywhere the fashionable French cos- 
tumes — everywhere the French tongue. And amid 
that fashion and gayety of the West the fez and the 

•84 



We Enter the Orient 



turban and the long flowing robe of the Orient mingled 
silently, while here and there little groups of elderly, 
dignified sons of the desert stood in quiet corners, 
observing and thinking long thoughts. And this is 
the Algiers of to-day — the West dominant — the East 
a memory and a dream. 



XII 



WE TOUCH AT GENOA 

WE lost some of our passengers — the wrong 
ones — at Algiers. They wanted to linger 
awhile in that lovely place, and no one could blame 
them. Only I wish that next time we are to lose 
passengers I might make the selection. I would pick, 
for instance — no, on the whole, I am not the one to 
do it. I am fond of all of our people. They are pecu- 
liar, most of them, as mentioned before — all of them, 
I believe, except me — but thinking it over I cannot 
decide on a single one that I would be willing to spare. 
Even the Porpoise — But we have grown to love the 
Porpoise, and the news that we are to lose him at 
Genoa saddens me. 

We were pitched from Algiers to Genoa — not all at 
one pitch, though we should have liked that better. 
A gale came up out of the north and, great ship as the 
Kurfiirst is, we stood alternately on our hind feet and 
our fore feet all the way over — two nights and a day 
— while the roar and howl of the wind were appalling. 
We changed our minds about the placid, dreamy 
disposition of the Mediterranean; also, about sunny 
Italy. 

When the second morning came we were still a 
good way outside the harbor of Genoa, in the grip of 
such a norther and blizzard as tears through the 

86 



We Touch at Genoa 



Texas Panhandle and leaves dead cattle in its wake. 
Sunny Italy indeed! The hills back of Genoa, when 
we could make them out at last, were white with 
snow. To go out on deck was to breast the pene- 
trating, stinging beat of the storm. 

But I stood it awhile to get an impression of the 
harbor. It is no harbor at all, but simply a little 
corner of open sea, partly enclosed by breakwaters 
that measurably protect vessels from heavy seas, 
when one can get through the entrance. With our 
mighty engines and powerful machinery we were 
beating and wallowing around the entrance for as 
much as two hours, I should think, before we could 
get inside. You could stow that harbor of Genoa 
anywhere along the New York City water-front, 
shipping and all, and then you would need to employ 
a tug-boat captain to find it for you. It is hard to 
understand how Genoa obtained her maritime im- 
portance in the old days. 

(I have just referred to the guide-book. It says: 
"The magnificent harbor of Genoa was the cause 
of the mediaeval prosperity of the city," and adds 
that it is about two miles in diameter. Very well; 
I take it all back. I was merely judging from obser- 
vation. It has led me into trouble before.) 

We were only to touch at Genoa; some more of 
our passengers were to leave us, and we were to take 
on the European contingent there. It was not ex- 
pected that there would be much sight-seeing, 
especially on such a day, but some of us went ashore 
nevertheless. Laura, age fourteen, and I were among 
those who went. We set out alone, were captured 

87 



The Ship -Dwellers 



immediately by a guide, repelled him, and temporarily 
escaped. It was a mistake, however; we discovered 
soon that a guide would have been better on this 
bitter, buffeting day. 

We had no idea where to go, and when we spoke 
to people about it, they replied in some dialect of 
Mulberry Street that ought not to be permitted at 
large. Laura tried her French on them presently, 
but with no visible effect, though it had worked 
pretty well in Algiers. Then I discovered a German 
sign, over a restaurant or something, and I said I 
would get information there. 

I had faith in my German since my practice on 
the stewards, and I went into the place hopefully. 
What I wanted to ask was "Where is Cook's?" the 
first question that every tourist wants to ask when he 
finds himself lost and cold and hungry in a strange 
land. But being lost and cold and hungry confused 
me, I suppose, and I got mixed in my adverbs, and 
when the sentence came out it somehow started with 
"Warum" instead of "Wo" so instead of asking 
"Where is Cook's?" I had asked "Why is Cook's?" 
a question which I could have answered myself if I 
had only known I had asked it. 

But I didn't realize, and kept on asking it, with a 
little more emphasis each time, while the landlord 
and the groups about the tables began to edge away 
and to reach for something handy and solid to use 
on a crazy man. I backed out then, and by the time 
I was outside I realized my slight error in the choice 
of words. I did not go .back to correct my inquiry. 
I merely told Laura that those people in there did 

88 



We Touch at Genoa 



not seem very intelligent, and that was true, or they 
would have known that anybody is likely to say 
"why" when he means "where," especially in Ger- 
man. 

There are too many languages in the world, anyway. 
There is nothing so hopeless as to hunt for information 
in a place where not a soul understands your language, 
and where you can't speak a word of his. The first 
man at your very side may have all the informa- 
tion you need right at his tongue's end, but it 
might as well be buried in a cellar so far as you are 
concerned. 

I am in deep sympathy with the people who in- 
vented Volapiik, and are trying to invent Esperanto. 
I never thought much about it before, but since I've 
been to Genoa I know I believe in those things. Only, 
I wish they'd adopt English as the universal speech. 
I find it plenty good enough. 

Laura and I made our way uphill and climbed some 
stairways, met a gendarme, got what seemed to be 
information, climbed down again, and met a man with 
a fish-net full of bread — caught in some back alley, 
from the looks of it. Then we followed a car-track 
a while along the deserted street, past black, desolate- 
looking houses, and were cold and discouraged and 
desperate, when suddenly, right out of heaven, came 
that guide, who had been following us all the time, of 
course, and realized that the psychological moment 
had come. 

We could have fallen on his neck for pure joy. 
Everything became all right, then. He could under- 
stand what we said, and we could understand what 

89 



The Ship -Dwellers 



he said; we tried him repeatedly and he could do it 
every time. That was joy and occupation enough at 
first. Then we asked him "Where was Cook's?" and 
he knew that too. It was wonderful. 

We grew to love that guide like a brother. It's 
marvellous how soon and fondly you can learn to 
love a rescuer like that when you are a stranger in a 
strange land and have been sinking helplessly in a 
sea of unknown words. 

He was a good soul, too; attentive without being 
officious, anxious to show us as much as possible in 
the brief space of our visit. He led us through the 
narrow, cleft-like streets of the old city; he pointed 
out the birthplace of Columbus and portions of the 
old city wall; he conducted us to the Hotel de Ville 
(the old Fieschi Palace), where we decided to have 
luncheon; he led us back to the ship at last, and 
trusted me while I went aboard to get the five lira 
of his charge. 

Whatever the Genoese guides were in the old days, 
this one was a jewel. If I had any voice in the matter 
Genoa would inscribe a tablet to a man like that and 
put his bones in a silver box and label them "St. 
John the Baptist" instead of the set of St. John bones 
they now have in the Cathedral of St. Lorenzo, which 
he pointed out to us. 

But the Cathedral itself was interesting enough. 
It was built in the ninth century, and is the first 
church we have seen that has interested us. In it 
Laura noticed again the absence of seats; for they 
kneel, on this side of the water, and know not the 
comfort of pews. 

90 



We Touch at Genoa 



We passed palaces galore in Genoa, but we had only 
time to glance in, except at the Fieschi, where we 
lunched, and later were shown the rooms where the 
famous conspiracy took place. I don't know what the 
conspiracy was, but the guide-book speaks of it as 
"the famous conspiracy," so everybody but me will 
know just which one is meant. It probably con- 
cerned the Ghibellines and the Guelphs, and had 
strangling in it and poison — three kinds, slow, me- 
dium, and swift — these features being usually identi- 
fied with the early Italian school. 

The dim, mysterious streets of Genoa interested 
us — many of the houses frescoed outside — and the 
old city gates, dating back to the crusade ; also some 
English signs, one of which said: 

DINNER 3 LIRA, WINE ENCLOSED, 

and another: 

MILK FOR SALE, OR TO LET. 

I am in favor of these people learning English, but 
not too well. The picturesque standard of those 
signs is about right. 

Our new passengers were crowding aboard the ship 
when we returned. They were a polyglot assort- 
ment, English, German, French, Hungarian — a happy- 
looking lot, certainly, and eager for the housing and 
comfort of the ship. But one dear old soul, a German 
music-master — any one could tell that at first glance — 
was in no hurry for the cabin. He had been looking 
forward to that trip. Perhaps this was his first 

91 



The Ship -Dwellers 



sight of the sea and shipping and all the things he 
had wanted so long. He came to where I was looking 
over the rail, his head bare, his white hair blowing in 
the wind. He looked at me anxiously. 

"Haben Sie Deutsch?" he asked. 

I confessed that I still had a small broken assort- 
ment of German on hand, such as it was. He pointed 
excitedly to a vessel lying near us — a ship with an 
undecipherable name in the Greek character. 

"Greek," he said, "it is Greek — a vessel from 
Greece!" 

He was deeply moved. To him that vessel — a 
rather poor, grimy affair — with its name in the 
characters of Homer and ^Eschylus was a thing to 
make his blood leap and his eyes grow moist, because 
to him it meant the marvel and story of a land made 
visible — the first breath of realization of what before 
had just been a golden dream. I had been thinking 
of those things, too. We did not mind the cold, 
and stood looking down at the Greek vessel while we 
sailed away. 

But a change has come over the spirit of our ship. 
It is a good ship still, with a goodly company — only it 
is not the same. We lost some worthy people in Genoa 
and we took on this European invasion. It is edu- 
cational, and here in the smoking-room I could pick 
up all the languages I need so much if I were willing 
to listen and had an ear for such things. I could pick 
up customs, too. It is after dinner, and the smoking- 
room is crowded with mingled races of both sexes, 
who have come in for their coffee and their cigarettes, 
their gossip and their games. Over there in one cor- 

92 



We Touch at Genoa 



ner is a French group — Parisian, without doubt — 
the women are certainly that, otherwise they could 
not chatter and handle their cigarettes in that dainty 
way — and they are going-on and waving their hands 
and turning their eyes to heaven in the interest and 
ecstasy of their enjoyment. Games do not interest 
them — they are in themselves sufficient diversion to 
one another. 

It is different with a group of Germans at the next 
table; they have settled down to cards — pinochle, 
likely enough — and they are playing it soberly — as 
soberly as that other group who are absorbed in chess. 
At still another table a game of poker is being organ- 
ized, and from that direction comes the beloved 
American tongue, carrying such words as "What's 
the blue chips worth?" " Shall we play jack-pots?" 
' * Does the dealer ante ? ' ' and in these familiar echoes 
I recognize the voices of friends. 

The centre of the smoking-room is different. The 
tables there are filled with a variegated lot of men 
and women, all talking together, each pursuing a dif- 
ferent subject — each speaking a language of his own. 
Every nation of Europe, I should think, is represented 
there — it is a sort of lingual congress in open session. 

The Reprobates no longer own the smoking-room. 
They are huddled off in a corner over their game of 
piquet, and they have a sort of cowed, helpless look. 
Only now and then I can see the Colonel jerk his hat 
a bit lower and hear him say, "Hell, Joe!" as the 
Apostle lay down his final cards. Then I recognize 
that we are still here and somewhat in evidence, 
though our atmosphere is not the same. 
7 93 



The Ship-Dwellers 



That couldn't be expected. When you have set 
out with a crowd of pleasure-seeking irresponsibles, 
gathered up at random, and have become a bit of 
the amalgamation which takes place in two weeks' 
mixing, you somehow feel that a certain unity has 
resulted from the process and you are reluctant about 
seeing it disturbed. You feel a personal loss in every 
face that goes — a personal grievance in every stranger 
that intrudes. 

The ship's family has become a sort of club. It 
has formed itself into groups and has discussed its 
members individually and collectively. It has found 
out their business and perhaps some of the hopes 
and ambitions — even some of the sorrows — of each 
member. Then, suddenly, here is a new group 
of people that breaks in. You know nothing about 
them — they know nothing about you. They are 
good people, and you will learn to like some of them — 
perhaps all of them — in time. Yet you regard them 
doubtfully. Rearrangement is never easy, and amal- 
gamation will be slow. 

Oh, well, it is ever thus, and it is the very evan- 
escence of things that makes them worth while. That 
old crowd of ours would have grown deadly tired of 
one another if there hadn't been always the prospect 
and imminence of change. And, anyhow, this is 
far more picturesque, and we are sailing to-night 
before the wind, over a smooth sea, for Malta, and it 
has grown warm outside and the lights of Corsica are 
on our starboard bow. 



XIII 



MALTA, A LAND OF YESTERDAY 

WE came a long way around from Algiers to 
"Malta and its dependencies," the little group 
of islands which lies between Sicily and the African 
coast. We have spent two days at sea, meantime, 
but they were rather profitable days, for when one 
goes capering among marvels, as we do ashore, he 
needs these ship days to get his impressions sorted 
out and filed for reference. 

We were in the harbor of Valetta, Malta, when we 
woke this morning — a rather dull morning — and a 
whole felucca of boats — flotilla, I mean — had appeared 
in the offing to take us ashore. At least, I suppose 
they were in the offing — I'm going to look that word 
up, by and by, in the ship dictionary, and see what 
it means. They have different boats in each of the 
places we have visited — every country preserving its 
native pattern. These at Malta are a sort of gondola 
with a piece sticking up at each end — for ornament, 
probably — I have been unable to figure out any use 
for the feature. 

95 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We leaned over the rail, watching them and ad- 
miring the boatmen while we tried to recognize the 
native language. The Diplomat came along and 
informed us that it was Arabic, mixed with Italian, 
the former heavily predominating. The Arabs had 
once occupied the island for two hundred and twenty 
years, he said, and left their language, their archi- 
tecture, and their customs. He had been trying his 
Arabic on some natives who had come aboard and 
they could almost understand it. 

The Patriarch, who had been early on deck, came 
up full of enthusiasm. There was a Phoenician temple 
in Malta which he was dying to visit. It was the 
first real footprint, thus far, of his favorite tribe, and 
though we have learned to restrain the Patriarch 
when he unlimbers on Phoenicians, we let him get off 
this time, softened, perhaps, by the thought of the 
ruined temple. 

The Phoenicians had, of course, been the first 
settlers of Malta, he told us, thirty-five hundred 
years ago, when Rome had not been heard of and 
Greece was mere mythology ; after which preliminary 
the Patriarch really got down to business. 

"We are told by Sanchuniathon," he said, "in the 
Phoinikika, which was not only a cosmogony but a 
necrological diptych, translated into Greek by Philo 
of Byblus, with commentary by Porphyry and pre- 
served by Eusebius in fragmentary form, that the 
Phoenicians laid the foundations of the world's arts, 
sciences, and religions, though the real character of 
their own faith has been but imperfectly expiscated. 
We are told—" 

96 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



The Horse-Doctor laid his hand reverently but 
firmly on the Patriarch's arm. 

" General," he said (the Patriarch's ship title is 
General) — ' 'General, we all love you, and we all respect 
your years and your learning. We will stand almost 
anything from you, even the Phoenicians; but don't 
crowd us, General — don't take advantage of our good- 
nature. We'll try to put up with Sanchuniathon and 
Porphyry and those other old dubs, but when you 
turned loose that word 'expiscated' I nearly lost 
control of myself and threw you overboard." 

The bugle blew the summons to go ashore. 
Amidst a clatter of Maltese we descended into the 
boats and started for the quay. Sitting thus low 
down upon the water, one could get an idea of the 
little shut-in harbor, one of the deepest and finest in 
the world. We could not see its outlet, or the open 
water, for the place is like a jug, and the sides are 
high and steep. They are all fortified, too, and 
looking up through the gloomy morning at the grim 
bastions and things, the place loomed sombre enough 
and did not invite enthusiasm. It was too much 
like Gibraltar in its atmosphere, which was not 
surprising, for it is an English stronghold — the 
second in importance in these waters. Gibraltar 
is the gateway, Malta is the citadel of the Mediter- 
ranean, and England to-day commands both. 

But Malta has had a more picturesque history than 
Gibraltar. Its story has been not unlike that of 
Algiers, and many nations have fought for it and shed 
blood and romance along its shores, and on all the 
lands about. We touched mythology, too, here, for 

97 



The Ship -Dwellers 



the first time; and Bible history. Long ago, even 
before the Phoenicians, the Cyclops — a race of one- 
eyed giants — owned Malta, and here Calypso, daugh- 
ter of Atlas, lived and enchanted Ulysses when he 
happened along this way and was shipwrecked on 
the "wooded island of Ogygia, far apart from men." 

I am glad they do not call it that any more. It is 
hard to say Ogygia, and it is no longer a wooded isle. 
It is little more than a rock, in fact, covered with a 
thin, fertile soil, and there are hardly any trees to be 
discovered anywhere. But there were bowers and 
groves in Ulysses' time, and Calypso wooed him 
among the greenery and in a cave which is pointed 
out to this day. She promised him immortality if 
he would forget his wife and native land, and marry 
her, but Ulysses postponed his decision, and after a 
seven-year sample of the matrimony concluded he 
didn't care for perpetual existence on those terms. 

Calypso bore him two sons, and when he sailed 
away died of grief. Ulysses returned to Penelope, 
but he was disqualified for the simple life of Ithaca, 
and after he had slain her insolent suitors and told 
everybody about his travels he longed to go sailing 
away again to other adventures and islands, and 
Calypsos, perhaps, "beyond the baths of all the 
western stars." Such was life even then. 

The Biblical interest of Malta concerns a shipwreck, 
too. St. Paul on his way to Italy to preach the 
gospel was caught in a great tempest, the Eurocly- 
don, which continued for fourteen days. Acts xxvii, 
xxviii contain the story, which is very interesting and 
beautiful. 

98 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



Here is a brief summary. 

"And when the ship was caught, and could not 
bear up in the wind, we let her drive. . . . 

"And when neither sun nor stars in many days 
appeared, and no small tempest lay upon us, all hope 
that we should be saved was taken away." 

Paul comforted them and told how an angel had 
stood by him, assuring him that he, Paul, would 
appear before Caesar and that all with him would be 
saved. "Howbeit, we must be cast upon a certain 
island." 

The island was Melita {i.e., Malta), and "falling 
into a place where two seas met, they ran the ship 
aground." 

There were two hundred and sixteen souls in the 
vessel, and all got to land somehow. 

"And the barbarous people showed us no little 
kindness: for they kindled a fire and received us 
every one, because of the present rain, and because of 
the cold." 

Paul remained three months in Malta and preached 
the gospel and performed miracles there, which is a 
better record than Ulysses made. He also banished 
the poison snakes, it is said. It was the Euroclydon 
that swept the trees from Malta, and nineteen hundred 
years have not repaired the ravage of that storm. 

Gods, Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, 
Arabs, Normans, Germans, Spanish, Knights of Jeru- 
salem, French, and English have all battled for Malta 
because of its position as a stronghold, a watch-tower 
between the eastern and western seas. All of them 
have fortified it more or less, until to-day it is a sort of 

99 



The Ship -Dwellers 



museum of military works, occupied and aban- 
doned. 

After the Gods, the Phoenicians were the first 
occupants, and with all due deference to the Patriarch, 
they were skedaddling out of Canaan at the time, 
because Joshua was transacting a little business in 
warfare which convinced them that it was time to 
grow up with new countries farther west. The 
Knights of Jerusalem — also known as the Knights 
of St. John and the Knights of Rhodes — were the 
last romantic inheritors. The Knights were originally 
hospital nurses who looked after pilgrims that went 
to visit the Holy Sepulchre, nearly a thousand years 
ago. They became great soldiers in time : knightly 
crusaders with sacred vows of chastity and service to 
the Lord. Charles V. of Spain gave them the Island of 
Malta, and they became the Knights of Malta hence- 
forth. They did not maintain their vows by and by, 
but became profligates and even pirates. Meantime 
they had rendered mighty service to the Mediter- 
ranean and the world at large. 

They prevented the terrible Turk from overrunning 
and possessing all Europe. Under John de la Valette, 
the famous Grand Master, Malta stood a Turkish siege 
that lasted four months, with continuous assault and 
heavy bombardments. The Turks gave it up at last 
and sailed away, after a loss of over twenty thousand 
men. 

Only seven thousand Maltese and two hundred and 
sixty knights were killed, and it is said that before he 
died each knight had anywhere from fifty to a hundred 
dead Turks to his credit. It must have been hard to 

IOO 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



kill a knight in those days. I suppose they wore 
consecrated armor and talismans, and were strength- 
ened by special benedictions. And this all happened 
in 1565, after which La Valet te decided to build a 
city, and on the 28th of March, 1566, laid the corner- 
stone of Valetta, our anchorage. 

It is a curious place and interesting. When we 
landed at the quay our vehicles were waiting for us, 
and these were our first entertainment. They resem- 
bled the little affairs of Gibraltar, but were more 
absurd, I think. They had funny canopy tops — 
square parasol things with fancy edges — and there was 
no room inside for a tall man with knees. I was only 
partly in my conveyance, and I would have been will- 
ing to have been out of it altogether, only we were 
going up a steep hill and I couldn't get out without 
damage to something or somebody. Then we passed 
through some gates and entered the city. 

I don't think any of us had any clear idea of what 
Malta was like. It is another of those places that 
every one has heard of and nobody knows about. 
We all knew about Maltese cats because we had 
cats more or less Maltese at home, and we had heard 
of the Knights of Malta and of Maltese lace. But 
some of us thought Malta was a city on the north 
shore of Africa and the rest of us believed it to be an 
island in the Persian Gulf. 1 

However, these slight inaccuracies do not disturb 

1 There would seem to have been some sort of confusion of 
Malta with the city of Muscat. Perhaps the reader can figure out 
just what it was. It had something to do with domestic pets, I 
believe. 



The Ship -Dwellers 



us any more. We have learned to accept places 
where and as we rind them, without undue surprise. 
If we should awake some morning in a strange har- 
bor and be told that it was Sheol, we would merely say : 

"Oh yes, certainly; we knew it was down here 
somewhere. When can we go ashore?" 

Then we would set out sight-seeing and shopping 
without further remark, some of us still serene in the 
conviction that it was an African seaport, the rest 
believing it to be an island in the Persian Gulf. 

But there were no Maltese cats in Malta — not that I 
saw, and no knights, I think. What did strike us first 
was a herd of goats, goatesses I mean, being driven 
along from house to house and supplying milk. They 
were the mildest-eyed, most inoffensive little creatures 
in the world, and can carry more milk for their size 
than any other mammal, unless I am a poor judge. 
They did not seem to be under any restraint, but they 
never wandered far away from their master. They 
nibbled and loafed along, and were ready for business 
at call. They seemed much more reliable than any 
cows of my acquaintance. 

But presently I forgot the goats, for a woman came 
along — several women — and they wore a black head- 
gear of alpaca or silk, a cross between a sunbonnet 
and a nun's veil — hooped out on one side and looped 
in on the other — a curious head-gear, but not a bad 
setting for a handsome face. And those ladies had 
handsome faces — rich, oval faces, with lustrous eyes 
— and the faldette (they call it that) made a back- 
ground that melted into their wealth of atramentous 
hair. 

102 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



We have not seen handsome native women before, 
but they are plentiful enough here. None of them 
are really bad - looking, and every other one is a 
beauty, by my standards. 

We were well up into the city now, and could see 
what the place was like. The streets were not over- 
wide, and the houses had an Oriental look, with their 
stuccoed walls and their projecting Arab windows. 
They were full of people and donkeys — very small 
donkeys with great pack baskets of vegetables and 
other merchandise — but we could not well observe 
these things because of the beggars and bootblacks 
and would-be guides, besides all the sellers of postal 
cards and trinkets. 

It was worse than Madeira, worse than Gibral- 
tar, worse even than Algiers. England ought to be 
ashamed of herself to permit, in one of her posses- 
sions, such lavish and ostentatious poverty as exists in 
Malta. When we got out of the carriages we were 
overwhelmed. They stormed around us; they sepa- 
rated us; they fought over us; they were ready to 
devour us piecemeal. Some of us escaped into 
shops — some into the museum — some into St. John's 
Cathedral, which was across the way. 

Laura and I were among the last named, and we 
drew a long breath as we slipped into that magnificent 
place. We rejoiced a little too soon, however, for a 
second later we were nabbed by a guide, and there was 
no escape. We couldn't make a row in a church, 
especially as services were going on ; at least, we didn't 
think it safe to try. 

It is a magnificent church — the most elaborately 

103 



The Ship -Dwellers 



decorated, I believe, in all Europe. Grand Master 
John L'Eveque de la Cassar, at his own expense, put 
up the building, and all Europe contributed to its 
wealth and splendor. Its spacious floor is one vast 
mosaic of memorial tablets to dead heroes. There 
are four hundred richly inlaid slabs, each bearing a 
coat of arms and inscriptions in colors. They are 
wonderfully beautiful; no other church in the world 
has such a floor. Napoleon Bonaparte, who was a 
greater vandal than a soldier, allowed his troops to 
rifle St. John's when he took possession of Malta in 
1798. But there are riches enough there now and ap- 
parently Napoleon did not deface the edifice itself. 

The upper part of the Cathedral can only be com- 
prehended in the single word ' ' gorgeous. ' ' To attempt 
to put into sentences any impressions of its lavish 
ceiling and decorations and furnishings would be to 
cheapen a thing which, though ornate, is not cheap 
and does not look so. There are paintings by Cor- 
reggio and other Italian masters, and rare sacred 
statuary, and there is a solid silver altar rail which 
Napoleon did not carry off because a thoughtful 
priest quickly gave it a coat of lampblack when he 
heard the soldiers coming. 

The original keys of Jerusalem and several other 
holy places are said to be in one of the chapels, and 
in another is a thorn from the Saviour's crown, the 
stones with which St. Stephen was martyred, and 
some apostolic bones. These things are as likely to be 
here as anywhere, and one of the right hands of John 
the Baptist, encased in a gold glove, was here when 
Napoleon came. Napoleon took up the hand and 

104 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



slipped off a magnificent diamond ring from one of 
the fingers. Then he slipped the ring on his own 
finger and tossed the hand aside. 
"Keep the carrion," he said. 

They hate the memory of Napoleon in Malta to 
this day. 

The ceiling of the church is a mass of gold and color, 
and there are chapels along the sides, each trying to 
outdo the next in splendor. I am going to stop descrip- 
tion right here, for I could do nothing with the details. 

I have mentioned that services were in progress, 
but it did not seem to interfere with our sight-seeing. 
It would in America, but it doesn't in Malta. There 
was chanting around the altar, and there were wor- 
shippers kneeling all about, but our guide led us 
among them and over them as if they had not 
existed. It seemed curious to us that he could do 
this, that we could follow him unmolested. We tried 
to get up some feeling of delicacy m the matter, and 
to make some show of reluctance, but he led us and 
drove us along relentlessly, and did not seem to fear 
the consequences. 

We got outside at last and were nailed by a frowsy 
man who wanted to sell one grimy postal card of the 
Chapel of Bones. We didn't want the card, but we 
said he might take us to the chapel if he knew the 
way. Nothing so good as that ever came into his 
life before. From a mendicant seller of one wretched 
card, worth a penny at most, he had suddenly blos- 
somed into the guide of two American tourists. The 
card disappeared. With head erect he led the way as 
one having received knighthood. 

105 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Our crowd was waiting admission outside the chapel 
and we did not need our guide any more. But that 
didn't matter — he needed us. He accepted his salary 
to date, but he did not accept his discharge. We 
went into the Chapel of Bones, which is a rather 
grewsome place, with a lot of decorations made out 
of bleached human remnants — not a pleasant spot 
in which to linger — and when we came out again there 
was our guide, ready to take us in hand. We resisted 
feebly, but surrendered. We didn't care for the 
regular programme and wanted to wander away, any- 
how. He suggested that we go to the Governor's 
palace and armory, so we went there. 

The armory was worth while. It was full of armor 
of the departed knights and of old arms of every 
sort. We think breech-loading guns are modern, but 
we saw them there from the sixteenth century — long, 
deadly-looking weapons — and there were rope guns; 
also little mortars not more than three or four inches 
deep — mere toys — a stout man with a pile of rocks 
would be more effective, I should think. 

We saw the trumpet, too, that led La Valette to 
victory in 1 565, and some precious documents — among 
them the Grant of Malta made by Charles V. to the 
knights, 1530. These were interesting things and we 
lingered there until within a minute of noon, when we 
went out into the grounds to see the great bronze 
clock on the Governor's palace strike twelve. 

And all the rest of our party had collected in the 
grounds of the Governor's palace, and pretty soon the 
Governor came out and made us a little speech of 
welcome and invited us to luncheon on the lawn, 

106 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



with cold chicken and ices and nice fizzy drinks. No, 
that was not what happened — not exactly. Our 
crowd was not there, and we did not see the Gov- 
ernor and we were not invited to picnic on the lawn. 
Otherwise the statement is correct. We did go out 
into the grounds, and we did see the clock strike. 
The other things are what we thought should happen, 
and they would have happened if we had received 
our just deserts. 

Well, then, those things did not materialize, but 
our guide did. He would always materialize, so long 
as we stayed in Malta. So we re-engaged him and 
signified that we wanted food. He led us away to 
what seemed to be a hotel, but the clerk, who did not 
speak English, regarded us doubtfully. Then the 
landlord came. He had a supply of English but no 
food. No one is fed at a hotel in Malta who has not 
ordered in advance. At least, that is what he said, 
and we went away, sorrowing. 

We were not alone. A crowd had collected while 
we were inside — a crowd of the would-be guides and 
already beggars, with sellers and torments of various 
kinds. We were assailed as soon as we touched the 
street, and our guide, who was not very robust, was 
not entirely able to protect us from them. He did 
steer us to a restaurant, however, a decent enough 
little place, and on the steps outside they disputed 
for us and wrangled over us and divided us up while 
we ate. It was like the powers getting ready to dis- 
member China. 

We laid out our programme for the afternoon. We 
wanted to get some Maltese lace, and to make a little 

107 



The Ship -Dwellers 



side trip by rail to Citta Vecchia (the old city) which 
two native gentlemen at our table told us would 
give us a good idea of the country. Then we paid 
our bill, had a battle with a bootblack who had sur- 
reptitiously been polishing my shoes, fought our way 
through the barbarians without, and finally escaped 
by sheer flight, our guide at our heels. 

We told him that we wanted lace. Ah, a smile 
that was like morning overspread his face. He 
took us to a large shop, where we found some of 
our friends already negotiating, but we did not 
linger. We said we wanted to find a little shop — 
a place where it was made. He led us to another 
bazaar. Again we said, ''No, a little shop — a very 
little shop, on a back street." 

Clearly he was disappointed. He did find one for 
us, however, a tiny place in an alley, with two bent, 
wrinkled women weaving lace outside the door. 

How their deft fingers made those little bobbins fly, 
and what beautiful stuff it was, creamy white silk in 
the most wonderful patterns and stitches. They 
showed us their stock eagerly, and they had masses of 
it. Then we bargained and cheapened and haggled, in 
the approved fashion we have picked up along the 
way, and went off at last with our purchases, every- 
body happy — they because they would have taken 
less, we because we would have given more. Only 
our guide was a bit solemn. I suppose his commission 
was modest enough in a place like that. 

He took us to the railway-station — the only railway 
in Malta. Then I made a discovery: we had no 
current coin of the realm and the railway would take 

108 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



only English money. No matter. We had dis- 
charged our guide three times and paid him each 
separate time. He was a capitalist now, and he 
promptly advanced the needed funds. We were 




TWO BENT, WRINKLED WOMEN WEAV- 
ING LACE OUTSIDE THE DOOR 



grateful, and invited him to go along. But he said 
"No," that he would remain at the station until our 
return. 

He was faithful, you see, and he trusted us. Be- 
sides, we couldn't escape. There was only that one 
road and train. We took our seats in an open car, on 
account of the scenery. We didn't know it was third- 
class till later, but we didn't mind that. What we 
did mind was plunging into a thick, black, choking 
8 109 



The Ship -Dwellers 



tunnel as soon as we started ; then another and another. 
This was scenery with a vengeance. 

We were out at last, and in a different world. What- 
ever was modern in Malta had been left behind. This 
was wholly Eastern — Syrian — a piece out of the Holy 
Land, if the pictures tell us the truth. Everywhere 
were the one-story, flat- topped architecture and the 
olive-trees of the Holy Land pictures; everywhere 
stony fields and myriads of stone walls. 

At a bound we had come from what was only a few 
hundred years ago, mingled with to-day, to what was 
a few thousand years ago, mingled with nothing 
modern whatever. There is no touch of English 
dominion here, or French, or Italian. This might be 
Syrian or Moorish ; it might be, and is Maltese. 

We saw men ploughing with a single cow and a 
crooked stick in a manner that has prevailed here 
always. We mentioned the matter to our railway- 
conductor, who was a sociable person and had not 
much to do. 

"You are from America," he said. 

"Yes, we are from America." 

"And do they use different ploughs there?" 

He spoke the English of the colonies, and it seemed 
incredible that he should not know about these things. 
We broke it to him as gently as possible that we did 
not plough with a crooked stick in America, but with 
such ploughs as were used in England. However, 
that meant nothing to him, as he had never been off 
the island of Malta in his life. His name was Carina, 
he told us, and his parents and grandparents before 
him had been born on the island. Still, I think he 



Malta, a Land of Yesterday 



must have had English or Irish pigment in that red 
hair of his. His English was perfect, though he 
spoke the Maltese, too, of course. 

He became our guide as we went along, willing and 
generous with his information, though more interested, 
I thought, in the questions he modestly asked us, now 
and then. His whole environment — all his traditions 
— had been confined to that little sea-encircled space 
of old, old town, and older, much older country. 

He would like to come to America, he confessed, 
and I wondered, if some day he should steam up New 
York harbor and look upon that piled architecture, 
and then should step ashore and find himself amidst 
its whirl of traffic, he would not be even more im- 
pressed by it than we were with his tiny forgotten 
island here to the south of Sicily. 

We passed little stations, now and then, with pretty 
stone and marble station-houses, but with no villages 
of any consequence, and came to Citta Vecchia, 
which the Arabs called Medina, formerly the capital 
of the island. It is a very ancient place, set upon a 
hill and bastioned round with walls that are too high 
to scale, and were once impregnable. It has stood 
many an assault — many a long-protracted siege. 
To-day it is a place of crumbling ruins and deserted 
streets — a mediaeval dream. 

It was raining when we got back to Valetta, and 
our faithful guide hurried us toward the boat -landing 
by a short way, for we were anxious to get home now. 
Every few yards we were assailed by hackmen and 
beggars, and by boatmen as soon as we reached the 
pier. He kept us intact, however, and got us into 

in 



The Ship -Dwellers 



our own boat, received the rest of his fortune — enough 
to set him up for life, by Maltese standards — waved us 
good-bye, and we were being navigated across the wide, 
rainy waste toward our steamer, which seemed to fill 
one side of that little harbor. 

What a joy to be on deck again and in the cosey 
cabin, drinking hot tea and talking over our advent- 
ures and purchases with our fellow- wanderers. The 
ship is home, rest, comfort — a world apart. We are 
weighing anchor now, and working our course out of 
the bottle-neck, to sea. It is a narrow opening — a 
native pilot directs us through it and leaves the ship 
only at the gateway. Then we sail through and out 
into the darkening sky where a storm is gathering — 
the green billows catching the dusk purple on their 
tips, the gulls white as they breast the rising wind. 

We gather on the after deck to say good-bye to 
Malta. Wall upon wall, terrace upon terrace it rises 
from the sea — heaped and piled back against the hills 
— as old, as quaint, as unchanged as it was a thousand 
years ago. Viewed in this spectral half-light it might 
be any one of the ancient cities. Ephesus, Antioch, 
Tyre — it suggests all those names, and we speak of 
these things in low voices, awed by the spectacle of 
gathering night and storm. 

Then, as the picture fades, we return to the lighted 
cabins, where it is gay and cheerful and modern, 
while there in the dark behind, that old curious 
island life still goes on; those curious shut-in people 
are gathering in their houses ; the day, with its cares, 
its worries, and its hopes is closing in on that tiny 
speck, set in that dark and lonely sea. 



XIV 



A SUNDAY AT SEA 

WE are in classic waters now. All this bleak Sun- 
day we have been steaming over the Ionian Sea, 
crossed so long ago by Ulysses when he went exploring ; 
crossed and recrossed a hundred times by the galleyed 
fleets of Rome. We have followed the exact course, 
perhaps, of those old triremes with their piled -up 
banks of oars, when they sailed away to conquer the 
East, also when they returned loaded down with 
captives and piled high with treasure. 

A little while ago Cythera was on our port bow, 
the island where Aphrodite was born of wind and 
wave, and presently set out to make trouble among 
the human family. She and her son Cupid, who has 
always been too busy to grow up, have a good deal to 
answer for, and they are still at their mischief, and 
will be, no doubt, so long as men are brave and women 
fair. 

However, they seemed to have overlooked this 
ship. There is only one love-affair discoverable, and 
even that is of such a mild academic variety that it 
is doubtful whether that tricksy jade Venus and her 
dimpled son had any concern in the matter. It is 
rather a case of Diana's hunting, I suspect, and not 
a love-affair at all. 

I have mentioned that this is Sunday, but I acquired 

113 



The Ship -Dwellers 



this knowledge from the calendar. One would never 
guess it from the aspect of this ship and its company. 
We made a pretty good attempt at Sabbath observ- 
ance the first Sunday out, and we did something in 
that line a week later. But then we struck Genoa, 
where we lost the Promoter and took on this European 
influx of languages, and now Sunday is the same as 
Friday or Tuesday or any other day, and it would 
take an expert to tell the difference. 

I do not blame it all to the Europeans. They are a 
good lot, I believe, some of them I am sure are, and 
we have taken to them amazingly. They did teach 
us a few new diversions, but we were ready for in- 
struction and the Reprobates would have corrupted 
us anyhow, so it is no matter. The new-comers 
only stimulated our education and added variety to 
our progress. But they did make it bad for Sunday — 
the old-fashioned Sunday, such as we had the first 
week out. 

Not that our ' * pilgrims " are a bad lot — not by any 
means. They do whoop it up pretty lively in the 
booze-bazaar now and then, and even a number of 
our American ladies have developed a weakness for 
that congenial corner of the ship. But everything is 
p. p., which is Kurfiirst for perfectly proper, and on 
this particular Sunday you could not scrape up 
enough real sin on this ship to interest Satan five 
minutes. 

Even the Reprobates are not entirely abandoned, 
and only three different parties have been removed 
from their table in the dining-saloon by request — 
request of the parties, that is — said parties being 

114 



A Sunday at Sea 



accustomed to the simpler life — pleasant diversions 
of the home circle, as it were — and not to the sparkle 
and the flow of good-fellowship on the high seas, with 
the bon mot of the Horse-Doctor, the repartee of the 
Colonel, and the placid expletive of the Apostle 
which the rest of us are depraved enough to adore. 

The Apostle, by-the-way, is going to Jerusalem. He 
has been there before, which he does not offer as a 
reason for going again, for he found no comfort there, 
and he is unable to furnish the Doctor with a sane 
reason why any one should ever want to go there, 
even once. I suspect that when the sale of tickets 
for the side trips began the Apostle, in his innocence, 
feared that there might not be enough to go around, 
and thought that he had better secure one in case of 
accident. I suspect this from his manner of urging 
the Doctor to secure one for himself. 

"You'll be too late, if you're not careful," he said. 
"You'd better go right up and get your ticket now." 

The Doctor was not alarmed. "Don't worry, Joe," 
he said. "You're booked for Jerusalem, all right 
enough. I'll get mine when I decide to go." 

"But suppose you decide to go after the party is 
made up ? " 

The Doctor stroked his chin. " Hell-of-a-note if I 
can't go ashore and buy a ticket for Jerusalem," he 
said, which had not occurred to the Apostle, who 
immediately remembered that he didn't want to go 
to Jerusalem anyway, had never wanted to go, and 
had vowed, before, he would never go again. 

However, he will go, because the Colonel is going; 
and the Colonel is going because, as the Doctor still 

i'5 



The Ship -Dwellers 



insists, he made his money by publishing Bibles with- 
out reading them, which I think doubtful — not doubt- 
ful that he did not read them, but that he is going to 
the Holy Land in consequence. I think he is going 
because he knows the Apostle is going — and the Doc- 
tor, and the game of piquet. Those are reasons 
enough for the Colonel. He is ready at a moment's 
notice to follow that combination around the world. 

But if we no longer have services on these sea 
Sundays we have other features. The Music-Master 
plays for us, if encouraged, and he gave us a lecture 
this afternoon. It was on ancient music, or art, or 
archaeology, I am not sure which. I listened atten- 
tively and I am pretty sure it was one of those thing's. 
He is a delightful old soul and his German is the best 
I ever heard. If I could have about ten years' steady 
practice, twelve hours a day, I -think I could under- 
stand some of it. 

The "Widow" entertains us too. She belongs to 
the Genoa contingent, and is one of those European 
polyglots who speak every continental language and 
make a fair attempt at English. It is her naivete 
and unfailing good-nature that divert us. She ap- 
proached one of our American ladies who wears 
black. 

"You a widow, not?" she said. 

"Oh no, I am not a widow." 

"Ah, then mebbe you yus' divorce, like me." 

We get along well with the Europeans. Our cap- 
tain tells us he has never seen the nations mix more 
harmoniously, which means that we are a good lot, 
altogether, which is fortunate enough. 

116 



A Sunday at Sea 



But I am prone to run on about the ship and our 
travellers and forget graver things; I ought to be 
writing about Greece, I suppose, and of the wonders 
we are going to see, to-morrow, in Athens. I would 
do it, only I haven't read the guide-book yet, and 
then I have a notion that Greece has been done be- 
fore. The old Quaker City was quarantined and did 
not land her people in Greece (except two parties who 
went by night), and the "Innocents" furnishes only 
that fine description of the Acropolis by moonlight. 

But a good many other excursionists have landed 
there, and most of them have told about it, in one way 
and another. Now it is my turn, but I shall wait. 
I have already waited a long time for Athens — I do 
not need to begin the story just yet. Instead I have 
come out here on deck to look across to Peloponnesus, 
which has risen out of the sea, a long gray shore, our 
first sight of the mainland where heroes battled and 
mythology was born. 

I expected the shores of Greece would look like that 
— bleak, barren, and forbidding. I don't know why, 
but that was my thought — perhaps because the nation 
itself has lost the glory of its ancient days. The 
Music-Master is looking at it too. It means more to 
him than to most of us, I imagine. As he looks over 
to that gray shore he is seeing in his vision a land 
where there was once a Golden Age, when the groves 
sang with Orpheus and the reeds with Pan, while 
nymphs sported in hidden pools or tripped lightly in 
the dappled shade. 

To-morrow he will go mad, I think, for we shall 
anchor at Athens, in the Bay of Phaleron. 

117 



XV 



A PORT OF MISSING DREAMS 



HERE were low voices on the deck, just outside 



then; also that the light was coming in and that we 
were lying at anchor. I was up by that time. It 
was just at the first sunrising, and the stretch of 
water between the ship and the shore had turned 
a pinkish hue. Beyond it were some buildings, 
and above the buildings, catching the first glint of 
day on its structured heights, rose a stately hill. 

The Amiable Girl (I have mentioned her before, I 
believe) and a companion were leaning over the ship's 
rail, trying to distinguish outlines, blended in the 
vague morning light. The Amiable Girl was peering 
through a binocular, and I caught the words "Parthe- 
non" and "Caryatides"; then to her companion, 
"Take the glass." 

Which the other girl did, and, after gazing steadily 
for a moment, said: 

"Yes! Oh yes, indeed — I can see them now, 
quite distinctly!" 

And then, even with my naked eye, I could make 
out certain details of that historic summit we have 
travelled so far to see. Three miles away, perhaps, 
the Acropolis arose directly in front of us — its col- 
umned crown beginning to glow and burn in answer 




I realized that it was morning 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



to the old, old friend that has awakened it to glory, 
morning after morning, century after century, for a 
full twenty-three hundred years. 

The light came fast now, and with my glass I could 
bring the hilltop near. I could make out the Parthe- 
non — also the Temple of Victory, I thought, and those 
marble women who have seen races pass and nations 
crumble, and religions fade back into fable and the 
realm of shades. It was all aglow, presently — a vis- 
ion! So many wonderful mornings, we have had, but 
none like this. Nor can there be so many lives that 
hold in them a sunrise on the Acropolis from the Bay 
of Phaleron. 

I lost no time in getting on deck, but it seemed 
that everybody was there ahead of me. They were 
strung along the rail, and each one had his glass, 
or his neighbor's, and was pointing and discoursing 
and argufying and having a beautiful time. The 
Diplomat was holding forth on the similarity of 
modern and ancient Greek, and was threatening to 
use the latter on the first victim that came within 
range. The Patriarch, who is religious when he hap- 
pens to think about it, was trying to find Mars Hill, 
where St. Paul preached; the Credulous One was 
pointing out to everybody Lykabettos Hill as Mt. 
Ararat (information obtained from the Horse-Doctor) , 
while the Apostle and the Colonel were quarrelling 
fiercely over a subject which neither of them knew 
anything about — the rise of Christianity in Greece. 

I got into a row myself, presently, with one of the 
boys, just because I happened to make some little 
classical allusion — I have forgotten what it was now, 

119 



The Ship -Dwellers 



and I didn't seem to know much about it then, from 
what he said. We were all stirred up with knowl- 
edge, brought face to face with history, as we were, 
and bound to unload it on somebody. Only the 
Music-Master wasn't. A little apart from any group, 
he stood clutching the rail, his face shining with a 
light that was not all of the morning, gazing in 
silence at his hill of dreams. 

We went ashore in boats that had pretty Greek 
rugs in them, and took a little train on which all 
the cars were smoking-cars (there are no other kind 
in Greece), and we looked out the windows trying 
to imagine we were really in Greece where once the 
gods dwelt; where Homer sang and Achilles fought; 
where the first Argonauts set sail for the Golden 
Fleece. I wish we could have met those voyagers 
before they started. They wouldn't have needed to 
go then. They could have taken the Golden Fleece 
off of this crowd if they had anything to sell in that 
Argosy of theirs, and their descendants are going to 
do it yet. I know from the conversation that is 
going on behind me. The Mill and a lot of her boon 
companions are doing the talking, and it is not of the 
classic ruins we are about to see, but of the lace they 
bought in Malta and Gibraltar, and of the embroidery 
they are going to buy in Greece. 

Our chariots were waiting at the station — carriages, 
I mean, nice modern ones — and we were started in a 
minute, and suddenly there was the Theseum, the 
best preserved of Greek ruins, I believe, right in 
front of us, though we did not stop for it then. But 
it was startling — that old, discolored temple standing 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



there unenclosed, unprotected, unregarded in the busy 
midst of modern surroundings. 

We went swinging away down a fine street, staring 
at Greek signs and new types of faces ; the occasional 
native costume; the little panniered donkeys lost in 
their loads of fruit. I was in a carriage with Laura 
and the Diplomat, and the Diplomat translated 
Greek signs, rejoicing to find that he could make 
out some of the words; also that he could get a 
rise out of the driver when he spoke to him, though 
it wasn't certain whether the driver, who was a very 
large person in a big blue coat (we christened him the 
Blue Elephant) , was talking to him of the horse, and 
we were all equally pleased, whichever it was. 

The Acropolis was in sight from points here and 
there, but we did not visit it yet. Instead, we turned 
into a fine boulevard, anchored for a time at the 
corner of a park, waiting for guides, perhaps, then 
went swinging down by the royal gardens and the 
white marble palace of the king. 

It is King George First now, a worthy successor 
to the rulers of that elder day when Greek art and 
poetry and national prosperity set a standard for 
the world. Athens was a pretty poor place when 
King George came to the throne in 1863. He was 
only eighteen years old, then — the country was 
bankrupt, the throne had gone begging. In Inno- 
cents Abroad Mark Twain says : 

''It was offered to one of Victoria's sons, and after- 
wards to various other younger sons of royalty who 
had no thrones and were out of business, but they all 
had the charity to decline the dreary honor, and 

121 



The Ship -Dwellers 



veneration enough for Greece's ancient greatness to 
refuse to mock her sorrowful rags and dirt with a 
tinsel throne in this day of her humiliation — till 
they came to this young Danish George, and he took it. 
He has finished the splendid palace I saw in the 
radiant moonlight the other night, and is doing many 
other things for the salvation of Greece, they say." 

This was written in 1867, four years after King 
George ascended the throne. For the good of Greece 
he has been spared these forty years and more to 
continue the work which in this noble palace he began. 
Athens is no longer a mendicant and a reproach, but 
a splendid marble city, preserving her traditions, 
caring for her ruins, re-establishing her classic tongue. 

The Diplomat told us some of these things as we 
drove along and the others we could see for ourselves. 
Then suddenly we were brought face to face with the 
most amazing example of Athens renewed. We were 
before a splendid marble entrance — a colonnade of 
white pentelican stone, pure and gleaming in the sun. 
We entered and were in the vastest amphitheatre I 
ever saw — the mightiest ever built, I should think — 
all built of the pure white pentelican, the marble 
seats ranging tier upon tier and stretching away until 
it looks as if the audiences of the world might be 
seated there. It was the Stadium, the scene of the 
Pan-Hellenic games, restored upon the spot where 
the ancient stadium stood — renewed in all its splendor 
by a rich Greek named George Averof , a monument 
such as no other Greek has left behind. 

Yet it was King George, I believe, who was chiefly 
responsible for this noble work. The ancient stadium 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



was laid out in a natural hollow by Lycurgus, before 
Christ over three hundred years, and was rebuilt 
something less than five hundred years later by the 
Averof of that day, Herodes Atticus, whose body 
was buried there. Then came the tumble and crumble 
of European glory; the place fell into ruin, was cov- 
ered with debris, and lay forgotten or disregarded for 
a thousand years ; after which, King George took up 
the matter, and dug out the remains as soon as he 
could get money for the job. 

That was Averof 's inspiration. Without it he 
would most likely have spent his money in Alexandria, 
where he made it. Certainly without King George 
to point the way the progress of Athens would have 
been a sorry straggle instead of a stately march. 

The stadium seats fifty thousand, and has held half 
as many more when crowded. In the revived Olympic 
games in 1896 the Greeks won twelve prizes, the 
Americans followed with eleven, France carried off 
three, and the English one. That was a good record 
for the Americans, and we didn't fail to mention it, 
though I think most of us were thinking of those older 
games, won and lost here under this placid sky, and 
of the crowds that had sat here and shouted themselves 
hoarse as the victors turned the goal. Then, standing 
high on the marble seats, we looked across the entrance, 
and there rose the Acropolis, lifted high against the 
blue, just as those old spectators had seen it so long 
ago. Through half -closed lashes we re-created it in 
gleaming pentelican and so gazed upon a vision, the 
vision they had seen. 

It was hard to leave that place. It would have 

123 



The Ship -Dwellers 



been harder, if it had not been for the guide we had. 
He insisted on talking in some language which nobody 
recognized, and which upon inquiry I was surprised 
to find was English. He had learned it overnight, it 
having been discovered that the guide engaged for 
our party had been detained — probably in jail — for 
the same offence. Still our sample would have done 
better if he had sat up later. As it was he knew 
just two words. He would swing his arms and point 
to something and begin, "You see — !" The rest re- 




HE WOULD SWING HIS ARMS AND BEGIN, " YOU SEE !" THE 

REST REQUIRED A MIND-READER 



quired a mind-reader. The German guide was bet- 
ter — much better. I haven't a perfect ear for Ger- 
man, but I concluded to join that party. 

It was not far to the Temple of Jupiter — the group 

124 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



of fifteen Corinthian columns which are all that remain 
of what Aristotle called ' ' a work of despotic grandeur. ' ' 
It must have been that. There were originally one 
hundred and four of these columns, each nearly 
sixty feet high and more than five and a half feet 
in diameter. Try to imagine that, if you can! 

Think of the largest elm-tree you know; its trunk 
will not be as thick as that, nor as high, but it will 
give you a tangible idea. Then try to imagine one 
hundred and four marble pillars of that size, the side 
extending in double row the length of a city block, 
and the ends in triple row a little less than half as 
far — pure-white and fluted, crowned with capitals of 
acanthus leaves, and you will form some vague idea 
of what Aristotle meant. We cramped our necks and 
strained our eyes, gazing at the beautiful remnant of 
that vast structure, but we did not realize the full 
magnitude of it until we came near a fallen column 
and stood beside it and stepped its length. Even 
then it was hard to believe that each of the graceful 
group still standing was of such size as this. 

Peisistratos the tyrant began this temple and pick- 
ed the location, said to be the spot where the last 
waters of the Deluge disappeared. It was to be 
dedicated to Deucalion, the founder of the new race 
of mortals, and the low ground was filled up and made 
level and bulwarked round with a stone substructure, 
as good to-day as when it was finished, twenty-five 
hundred years ago. 

Peisistratos did not get the temple done. He died 
when it was only fairly under way, and his sons did 
not remain in power long enough to carry out his 
9 125 



The Ship-Dwellers 



plans. He was a tyrant, though a gentle one, am- 
bitious and fond of all lovely things. He had his 
faults, but they were mainly lovable ones, and he 
fostered a cultivation which within a century would 
make Athens the architectural garden of the world. 

The example of Peisistratos was followed lavishly 
during the next hundred years, but his own splendid 
temple was overlooked. Perhaps Pericles did not 
like the location and preferred to spend his money on 
the Acropolis, where it would make a better showing. 
I don't know. I know it was left untouched for 
nearly four hundred years, and then the work was 
carried on by Antiochus of Syria, who constructed it 
on a grand scale. But it killed Antiochus, too, and 
then it waited another three hundred years for the 
Emperor Hadrian to come along, about 174 a.d., and 
complete it, and renew it, and dedicate it to Jupiter 
Olympus, whose reign by that time was nearly over. 

Never mind who built it, now, or what creed was 
consecrated there. The glory of the Golden Age rises 
on the hill above us, but I think one can meet nothing 
more impressive than this in all Greece. 

Hadrian's arch is just beyond the Temple of 
Jupiter, and we drove through it on our way to the 
Acropolis. It is not a very big arch, nor is it very 
impressive. I don't think Hadrian built it himself 
or it wouldn't have been like that. It looks as if it 
had been built by an economical successor. 

However, it is complimentary enough. On the side 
toward what was then the new part of Athens, called 
Hadrianople, is an inscription in Greek which says 
"This is the City of Hadrian, and not of Theseus," 

126 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



and on the side toward trie Acropolis, "This is the 
old city of Theseus." And old it was, for the newest 
temples on the Acropolis had been built six hundred 
years even then. 

It was only a little way to the foot of the Acropolis 
and the Theatre of Dionysus. We have visited no 
place where I wished so much to linger. This was 
the theatre of Greece in her Golden Age. Here 
^Eschylus and Euripides had their first nights — or 
days, perhaps, for I believe they were mostly matinees 
— and Sophocles, too, and here it was that the naughty 
Aristophanes burlesqued them with his biting parodies. 
Here it was they competed for prizes, and tried to be 
friends though playwrights, and abused the manager 
when they got into a corner together, and abused the 
actors openly, and vowed that some day they would 
build a theatre of their own where they could present 
their own plays in their own way, and where their 
suppressed manuscripts could get a hearing. 

Perhaps history does not record these things, but it 
does not need to. I know a good many playwrights 
and managers and actors, and I know that human 
nature has not changed in twenty-four hundred years. 
I know that the old, old war was going on then, just 
as it is now, and will continue to go on so long as 
there are such things as proscenium and auditorium, 
box-office, gallery, and reserved seats. 

I took one of the last named — a beautiful marble 
chair in the front row, just below the plinth where once 
the throne of Hadrian sat — a chair with an inscrip- 
tion which told that in the old days it was reserved 
for a priest or dignitary — and I looked across the 

127 



The Ship -Dwellers 



marble floor where the chorus did its rhythmic march, 
and beyond to the marble stage-front with its classic 
reliefs and the figure of Silenus whose bowed shoulders 
have so long been the support of dramatic art. The 
marble floor — they called it the Orchestra then — is 
no longer perfect, and grass and flowers push their way 
up between the slabs. The reliefs are headless and 
scarred, but the slabs are still the same the chorus 
trod, the place is still a theatre, and one has but to 
close his eyes a little to fill it with forms vague and 
shadowy indeed, as ghosts are likely to be, but realities 
none the less. Our party had moved along now to 
other things, and Laura and I lingered for the play. 

It was much better than our theatres at home. 
There was no dazzle of lights, no close air or smell of 
gas, and there was plenty of room for one to put his 
feet. However, the play I did not care for so much 
as the chorus. The acting was heavy and stilted, I 
thought, and declamatory. I was inclined to throw 
a piece of the theatre at the leading man. 

But the chorus! Why, the very words "Greek 
Chorus" have something in them that rouses and 
thrills, and I know, now, the reason why. In move- 
ment, in voice, in costume it was pure poetry. I 
would have applied for a position in the chorus myself, 
but Laura suddenly announced that the show was 
over and that everybody but us had gone long ago. 

If I had lived in that elder day I should have gone 
mainly to the plays of Aristophanes. They were gay 
and full of good things, and they were rare, too, and 
poetic, even though they were not always more than 
skin deep. That was deep enough for some of his 

128 



A Port of Missing Dreams 




I WOULD HAVE APPLIED FOR A POSITION IN THE CHORUS MYSELF 



contemporaries. Deep enough for the popocrat 
Cleon, who tried to deprive Aristophanes of his citizen- 
ship, in revenge. 

Aristophanes wrote a play that acted like a mustard- 
plaster on Cleon. It made him howl and caper and 
sweat and bring libel suits. Whereupon Aristophanes 
wrote another, and when he could get no actor to take 
the leading part — that of Cleon — he took it himself, 
and Cleon went to see it and wore out his teeth on 
tenpenny nails during the performance. Yes, I 
should have had a weakness for Aristophanes in those 
days, though I wish he might have omitted that 
tragic satire which twenty years later was to send 
Socrates the hemlock cup. 

129 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We climbed the hill a little way to a grotto and 
drank of the spring of iEsculapius and all our diseases 
passed away. It only cost a penny or two, and was 
the cheapest doctor bill I ever paid. I never saw a 
healthier lot than our party when they came out of 
the grotto and started for the Odeon — the little 
theatre which Herodes Atticus built in memory of his 
wife. 

Two thousand years ago Cicero wrote home from 
Athens: "Wherever we walk is history." We realize 
that here at the base of the Acropolis. From the 
Theatre of Dionysus to the Spring of ^Esculapius is 
only a step. From the Spring to the Sanctuary of 
Isis is another step ; from the Sanctuary to the Odeon 
of Herodes is a moment's walk; the Pnyx — the peo- 
ple's forum — is a stone's-throw away, and the Hill of 
Mars. All about, and everywhere, great events have 
trod one upon the other; mighty mobs have been 
aroused by oratory; mighty armies have rallied to 
the assault; a hundred battles have drenched the 
place with blood. And above all this rises the Acrop- 
olis, the crowning glory. 

We postponed the Acropolis until after luncheon. 
There would have been further riot and bloodshed 
on this consecrated ground had our conductor pro- 
posed to attempt it then. Our Argonauts are a fairly 
well-behaved lot and fond of antiquities, even though 
they giggle at the guide now and then, but they are 
human, too, and have the best appetites I ever saw. 
They would leave the Acropolis for luncheon, even 
though they knew an earthquake would destroy it 
before they could get back. 

130 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



We did stop briefly at the Pnyx hill — the gathering- 
place of the Athenians — and stood on the rostrum cut 
from the living rock — the "Bema" from which De- 
mosthenes harangued the populace. 




TOOK TURNS ADDRESSING THE MULTITUDE 



As usual Laura, age fourteen, and I got behind the 
party. We stood on the Bema and took turns ad- 
dressing the multitude, until we came near being left 
altogether by the Diplomat and the Blue Elephant, 
who finally whirled us away in a wild gallop to the 
hotel, which, thanks to Jupiter and all the Olympian 
synod, we reached in time. 

We made a new guide arrangement in the afternoon. 
It was discovered that the guide for the German 
party could handle English, too, so we doubled up 
and he talked to us first in one language, then in the 
other, and those of us who knew a little of both caught 

131 



The Ship -Dwellers 



it going and coming. Perhaps his English was not 
the best, but I confess I adored it. He lisped a little, 
and his voice — droning, plaintive, and pathetic — was 
full of the sorrow that goes with a waning glory and 
a vanished day. We named him Lykabettos because 
somehow he looked like that, and then, too, he towered 
above us as he talked. 

So long as I draw breath that afternoon on the 
Acropolis will live before me as a sunlit dream. I 
shall see it always in the tranquil light of an after- 
noon in spring when the distant hills are turning 
green and forming pictures everywhere between 
mellowed columns and down ruined aisles. Always 
I shall wander there with Laura, and resting on the 
steps of the Parthenon I shall hear the sad and gentle 
voice of Lykabettos recounting the tale of its glory 
and decline. I shall hear him say: 

"Zen Pericles he gazzer all ze moany zat was 
collect for ze army and he bring it here. But Pericles 
he use it to make all zese beautiful temple, and by and 
by when ze war come zere was no moany for ze army , 
so zay could not win." 

Lykabettos' eyes wander mournfully in the direc- 
tion of Sparta, whence the desolation had come. Then 
a little later, pointing up to a rare section of frieze — ■ 
the rest missing — ! 

"Zat did not fall down, but stay zere, always ze 
same — ze honly piece zat Lord Elgin could not take 
away," and so on and on, through that long sweet 
afternoon. 

I shall not attempt the story of the Acropolis here. 
The tale of that old citadel which later became 

i3 2 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



literally the pinnacle of Greek architecture already 
fills volumes. I do not think Lykabettos was alto- 
gether just to Pericles, however, or to Lord Elgin, 
for that matter. True, Pericles did complete the Par- 
thenon and otherwise beautify the Acropolis, and in 
a general way he was for architecture rather than war. 

But I do not find that he ever exhausted the public 
treasury on those temples, and I do find where his 
war policy was disregarded when disregard meant 
defeat. Still, if there had been more money and 
fewer temples on the Acropolis, the result of any 
policy might have been different, and there is some- 
thing pathetically gratifying in the thought that in 
the end Athens laid down military supremacy as the 
price of her marble crown. 

As for Lord Elgin, it may be, as is said, that he did 
earn' off a carload or so of the beautiful things when he 
had obtained from the Government (it was Turkish 
then) permission to remove a few pieces. But it 
may be added that the things he removed were wholly 
uncared for at that time and were being mutilated 
and appropriated by vandals who, but for Elgin, 
might have robbed the world of them altogether. 
As it is, they are safe in the British Museum, though 
I think they should be restored to Greece in this her 
day of reincarnation. 

We stood before the Temple of Victory and gazed 
out on the Bay of Salamis, where victory was won. 
We entered the Erechtheum, built on the sacred spot 
where Athena victoriously battled with Poseidon for 
the possession of Athens, and we stood in reverential 
awe before the marble women that have upheld her 

i33 



The Ship -Dwellers 



portico so long. We crossed the relic-strewn space 
and visited the Acropolis museum, but it was chilly 
and lifeless, and I did not care for the classified, 
fragmentary things. Then we entered the little en- 
closure known as Belvedere and gazed down on the 
Athens of to-day. 

If anybody doubts that modern Athens is beautiful, 
let him go to that spot and look down through the 
evening light and behold a marble vision such as the 
world nowhere else presents. Whatever ancient 
Athens may have been, it would hardly surpass this 
in beauty, and if Pericles could stand here to-day and 
gaze down upon the new city which has arisen to 
preserve his treasures, I think he would be satisfied. 

When the others had gone to visit the Hill of Mars, 
Laura and I wandered back to the Parthenon, fol- 
lowed its silent corridors, and saw it all again to our 
hearts' content. And when our eyes were tired, we 
rested them by looking out between the columns to 
the hills, Hymettus and Pentelicus, glorified in the 
evening light, wearing always their " violet crown." 

They are unchanged. Races may come and go, 
temples may rise and totter and crumble into dust. 
The old, old days that we so prize and honor — they 
are only yesterdays to the hills. The last fragment 
of these temples will be gone by and by — the last 
memory of their glory — but the hills will be still 
young and wearing their violet crown, still turning 
green in the breath of a Grecian spring. 

Down through that splendid entrance, the Propy- 
laea, at last, for it was growing late. We had intended 
climbing the Hill of Mars, where St. Paul preached, 

*34 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



but we could see it plainly in the sunset light and 
there was no need to labor up the stairs. I think it 
was about this time of the day when St. Paul preached 
there. He had been wandering about Athens, 
among the temples, on a sort of tour of observation, 
making a remark occasionally — of criticism, perhaps- 
disputing with the Jews in the synagogue, and now 
and again in the market-place. The story, told in 
the seventeenth chapter of Acts, begins: 

"Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans and 
of the Stoicks encountered him. And some said, 
'What will this babbler say ? ' Other some, 'He seem- 
eth to be a setter forth of strange gods,' because he 
preached unto them Jesus and the resurrection." 

They brought St. Paul here to the Areopagus, that 
is, to Mars Hill, where in ancient days an open-air 
court was held, a court of supreme jurisdiction in 
cases of life and death. But it would seem that 
the court had degenerated in St. Paul's time to a 
place of gossip and wrangle. "For all the Athenians 
and strangers which were there spent their time in 
nothing else, but either to tell or hear some new 
thing." 

Paul rose up before the assembly and made his 
famous utterance beginning, "Ye men of Athens, I 
perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious." 
It was a fearless, wonderful sermon he delivered, and 
I like to think that it was just at the hour when we 
saw the hill ; just at the evening-time, with the sun- 
set glory on his face. Paul closed his remarks with a 
reference to the resurrection, a doctrine new to them: 

i35 



The Ship -Dwellers 



"And when they heard of the resurrection of the 
dead, some mocked: and others said, 'We will hear 
thee again of the matter.'" 

Which they did, for that was nineteen hundred 
years ago, and the churches of Greece to-day still 
ring with St. Paul's doctrine. We climbed into our 
waiting carriages, and turning saw the Acropolis in 
the sunset, as we had seen it in the sunrise that now 
seemed ages ago — which indeed it was, for we had been 
travelling backward and forward since then through 
the long millennial years. 

I wanted to see Athens by night, and after dinner 
I slipped away and bribed a couple of boatmen who 
were hovering about the ship to take me ashore. 
It was not so far, but the wind and tide had kicked 
up a heavy sea and I confess I was sorry I started. 
Every time we slid down one wave I was certain we 
were going straight through the next, and I think the 
boatmen had some such idea, for they prayed steadily 
and crossed themselves whenever safety permitted. 

We arrived, however, and I took the little train 
for the Theseus station. I wanted to get a near view 
of the temple and I thought night would be a good 
time. I would have walked there but I did not quite 
know the way. So I got into a carriage and said 
"Theseum," and the driver took me to a beer-saloon. 
It was a cheerful enough temple, but it was not 
classic. When I had seen it sufficiently, I got into 
the carriage and said "Theseum" again, and he took 
me to a theatre. The theatre was not classic, either, 

136 



A Port of Missing Dreams 



being of about the average Bowery type. So I got 
into the carriage and said "Theseum" again, and he 
took me to a graveyard. It didn't seem a good time 
to visit graveyards. I only looked through the gate 
a little and got back into the carriage and said the 
magic word once more and was hauled off to a blazing 
hotel. 

That wouldn't do either. These might be, and 
doubtless were, all Theseums, but they were that in 
name only. What I wanted was the sure-enough, 
only original Theseum, set down in the guide-book 
as the best -preserved temple of the ancient Greek 
world. I explained this to a man in the hotel who 
explained it to my driver and we were off, down a 
beautiful marble business street, all closed and 
shuttered, for Athens being a capital is a quiet place 
after nightfall — as quiet as Washington, almost. 

We were in front of the old temple soon. It was 
fairly dark there and nobody about. There was a dog 
barking somewhere, but I did not mind that. Dogs 
are not especially modern, and this one might be the 
three-headed Cerberus for all I knew or cared. What 
I wanted was to see the old temple when other people 
had gone to bed and the shadows had shut away the 
less-fortunate near-by architecture. They had done 
that now ; the old temple might be amidst its earliest 
surroundings so far as I could see. 

I walked up and down among its graceful Doric 
columns and stepped its measurements, and found it 
over a hundred feet long and nearly fifty wide ; then 
I sat down on the step and listened to Cerberus bark — 
he had all three heads going at once now — and tried 

i37 



The Ship -Dwellers 



to imagine the life that had gathered there when this 
old fane was new. It is one of the temples of that 
brief golden period when all Athens burst into archi- 
tectural flower. It was dedicated to Theseus and Her- 
cules, and perhaps to a few other heroes and demi- 
gods and goddesses that they happened to think of 
when they laid the corner-stone. 

One story has it that it was built on the spot where 
the Marathon runner fell dead, after telling in a word 
his news of victory. I like to believe that this is 
true. I like to reassemble the crowds here — the 
anxious faces waiting for the earliest returns from 
that momentous struggle which would decide the 
fate of Greece. I like to picture that panting, white- 
faced runner as he dashes in among them and utters 
his single glad cry as his soul goes out, and I like to 
believe that this temple, dedicated to other heroes, 
was established here in his memory. 

But for Marathon there would have been no Golden 
Age — no Pericles, no Parthenon, no splendid con- 
stellation of names that need not be repeated here. 
The victory of Marathon was the first great check 
to a Persian invasion that would have Orientalized 
not only Greece, but all Europe. So it is proper that 
a temple should be built on the spot where that great 
news was told, and proper, too, that of all the temples 
of that halcyon time this should remain the most 
perfect through the years. 



XVI 



ATHENS THAT IS 



N the road that leads from the old market- 



v-x place, up past the Theseum to the Acropolis, 
there is a record of a humble but interesting sort. On 
the lower corner block of an old stone house, facing 
the highway, are three inscriptions. Two of them 
have been partly erased, but the third is quite legible, 
and one who knows Greek can read plainly a de- 
scription of the property in metes and bounds and 
the original Greek word for "hypothecated," followed 
by "iooo drachmas." 

It is a "live" mortgage, that is what it is, and it 
has been clinging to that property and piling up inter- 
est for more than two thousand years. The two half- 
obliterated inscriptions above it were once mortgages, 
too, but they were paid some time, and cancelled by 
erasure. The third one has never been satisfied, and 
would hold, like enough, in a court of law. 

The owner of the property wrestled with that 
mortgage, I suppose, and struggled along, and died 
at last without paying it. Or perhaps the great war 
came, with upheaval and dissolution of things in 
general. Anyway, it was never paid, but has stayed 
there century after century, compounding interest, 
until to-day the increment of that original thousand 
drachmas would redeem Greece. 




i39 



The Ship -Dwellers 



I was half a mind to look up the heirs of that old 
money-lender and buy their claim and begin their 
suit. Think of being involved in a tangle that has 
been stringing along through twenty-three centuries, 
and would tie up yesterday, to-day, and forever in a 
hard knot! I would have done it, I think, only that 
it might take another twenty-three centuries to settle 
it, and I was afraid the ship wouldn't wait. 

If there is any one who still does not believe that 
modern Athens is beautiful and a credit to her ancient 
name, let him visit as we did her modern temples. 
We had passed the ancient market entrance, the Tower 
of the Winds, and other of the old landmarks, when 
suddenly we turned into a wonderful boulevard, and 
drove by or visited, one after another, the New 
Academy, the University, the National Library, the 
Gallery of Fine Arts, and the National Museum. If 
Pericles were alive to-day he would approve of those 
buildings and add them to his collection. 

All the old classic grace and beauty have been 
preserved in the same pure-white pentelican marble, 
of which it is estimated that there is enough to last 
any city five thousand years. Corinthian, Ionic, 
and Doric columns that might have come from the 
Acropolis itself — and did, in design — adorn and sup- 
port these new edifices as they did the old, and lend 
their ineffable glory to the rehabilitation of Greece. 

We have learned, by-the-way, to distinguish the 
kinds of columns. They were all just Greek to us at 
first, but we know them now. When we see a column 
with acanthus leaves on the capital we know it is 
Corinthian, because we remember the story of the 

140 



Athens that Is 



girl of Corinth who planted acanthus on her lover's 
grave and put a hollow tile around it for protection. 
Some of the leaves came up outside of the tile by and 
by, and a young architect came along and got his 
idea for the Corinthian capital. 

We know the Ionic, too, because it looks like its 
initial — a capital ''I" with a little curly top — and 
we say "I" is for Ionic; and we can tell the Doric, 
because it's the only one that doesn't suggest any- 
thing particular to remember it by. It's worth com- 
ing to Greece to learn these things. We should never 
have learned them at home — never in the world. We 
should not have had any reason for wanting to learn 
them. 

We got tired of the Museum — Laura, age fourteen, 
and I — we were too young and frivolous for such 
things, though they are wonderful enough, I am sure. 
But then museums we have always with us, while a 
day in Athens is a fleeting thing. We wanted to take 
one of our private side-excursions, and we tried to 
communicate this fact to the Blue Elephant, who was 
our driver to-day, as yesterday. 

It was no light matter. He nodded and smiled 
when we indicated that we wanted to leave the pro- 
cession and go it on our own hook, but he did not 
move. We had already made up our minds that he 
was subject to fits, or was just plain crazy, for more 
than once he had suddenly broke away from the 
party and whirled us around side-streets for a dozen 
blocks or so to something not down on the programme, 
rejoining the procession in some unexpected place. 

But whatever may have induced his impulses then, 

10 141 



The Ship-Dwellers 



nothing seemed to stir his ambition for adventure 
now. I gesticulated and produced money; I sum- 
moned the Diplomat to tackle him in his best Xeno- 
phan, but it was no use. I got the guide at last, and 
then there was an exciting harangue that looked as if 
it might end in blood. I suppose our man thought he 
wouldn't get his full pay if he deserted the ship crowd. 
He must have been convinced, finally, for he leaped 
upon the box, and away we went in a wild race for 
the shops and by-streets where we had begged the 
guide to let us go. 

We had explained that we wanted some bags — 
some little embroidered bags, such as we had seen 
earlier in the day when we could not stop. The Blue 
Elephant understood now and took us to where there 
were bags — many bags. The whole street was lined 
with bags and other embroideries, and the Greeks 
turned out to give us a welcome. 

It is said that one Greek is equal to three Turks, 
and I believe it. The poorest Greek we saw was too 
much for two Americans, and we were beset and 
besieged and literally borne down and swamped by 
a rising tide of bags. We bought at many prices and 
in many places; we piled the carriage full and fled 
away at last when they were going to dump upon us 
a collection of costumes and firearms and draperies 
that would have required a flat-car. 

We were breathing easier when the Blue Elephant 
pulled us into another narrow street, and behold! it 
was another street of bags. Dear me! how could we 
explain that we had enough bags and wanted to see 
other things ? I would almost have given four hundred 

142 



Athens that Is 



dollars to have been able to tell him that I wanted 
to visit the old Byzantine structure we had passed that 
morning — the one with all the little shoemakers down- 
stairs — but the thing was impossible. I must buy 
some more bags, there was no help for it. So I did 
buy some more, and I picked out a place where a man 
spoke enough English to give the Blue Elephant a 
fresh start, which brought us at last to the old Byzan- 
tine building and the little shoemakers. 

Then we saw the street of a hundred clanking sounds 
— anyway we called it that, for they made all kinds of 
copper vessels in there — and we got out and told the 
Blue Elephant to wait, for the place was very narrow; 
but we couldn't lose him, seeing he was always on 
our heels, ready to whirl us away somewhere, any- 
where, in his crazy, fitty fashion. We had to let him 
do it, now, for we had used up all the interpreters we 
could 'find; besides, we didn't care, any more. 

Still, when it got to be near luncheon-time we did 
begin to wonder where the party had gone. It did 
not matter greatly, we could lunch anywhere, but we 
were curious to know whether we should ever see 
them or the ship again, and when we mentioned the 
matter to the Blue Elephant he merely grinned and 
whipped up his horses and capered across another 
square. But presently I realized that some sort of 
procession was passing and that he had turned into it. 
Then it was all just like dreams I've had, for it 
was our own procession, and we were calmly going 
along in it, and right away were being personally con- 
ducted through a remarkable church where the king 
and queen go, and sit in golden chairs. Alice in 

i43 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Wonderland could hardly have had a more surprising 
adventure. 

Our party being free after luncheon, Laura and 
I engaged Lykabettos on our own account and drove 
out to the Bay of Salamis, where Xerxes made his 
great mistake in the matter of fleets. 

Perhaps Lykabettos had taken a fancy to us, for 
he engaged a carriage that had been awarded a prize 
last year in the games, he said, and the team with it. 
We believed Lykabettos — anybody would — and any- 
way it was a beautiful outfit, and we cantered away 
over a fine road, past wayside shrines, past little huts 
and houses, past a little memorial that marks the 
place on a hill where Xerxes placed his silver-footed 
throne so that he might sit comfortably and watch 
the enemy's ships go down. Only, the programme 
didn't work out that way, Lykabettos said: 

"Zen Xerxes he pretty soon see zat it was not ze 
Greek ship zat sink, and he mus' run pretty quick or 
he will be capture ; and hees ship zay try to escape, and 
he not take away hees army from zat little island you 
see over zere ; zay stay zere and are all massacre by 
ze Greek — by ze men and ze women, too, who have 
watch ze battle from here and go over and kill zem." 

The little island Lykabettos pointed out was 
Psyttalleia, and the flower of Persia perished there. 
It was a tiny bit of barren land then, and it is to-day. 
The hills around Salamis are barren, too, covered 
only with a gray weed like the sage-brush of Nevada, 
and stunted groves of scrubby pine and ground cedar 
— referred to by Lykabettos as "ze forest." 

144 



Athens that Is 



We came to the tiny hamlet on the water's side, a 
collection of two or three huts, and Lykabettos en- 
gaged a lateen-sailed lugger (I should call it that, 
though its name was probably something else), and 
with a fresh wind half- ahead we billowed over the 
blue waters of Salamis, where twenty-five hundred 
years ago the Persian ships went down. It was a 
cloudy afternoon and there was a stormy feeling in 
the sky. It seemed just the time to be there, and 
there was nothing to dispel the illusion of imminent 
battle that was in the air. 

I was perfectly sure, and so was Laura, that the 
Persian fleet was likely at any moment to round the 
point and land troops on Pysttalleia; also that the 
Greek fleet was hiding somewhere in the Bay of 
Eleusis, and that there were going to be very disagree- 
able happenings there in a few minutes. There was a 
hut where we landed on the Island of Salamis and a 
girl making lace at the front door. She might have 
been there twenty-five hundred years ago, as well as 
not — perhaps was — and saw the great victory. 

We sailed back then, crossing again the exact spot 
where the battle raged, and drove home through the 
gathering evening, while Lykabettos recounted in that 
sad voice of his the history of ancient days. We are 
on the ship now, with anchor weighed, looking to 
the Farther East. Athens with its temples and its 
traditions drops below the horizon. Darkness and 
silence once more claim the birthplace of gods and 
heroes as we slip out of these quiet waters and head 
for the iEgean Sea. 



XVII 



INTO THE DARDANELLES 

WE saw but little of the Isles of Greece. It 
was night and we were tired after a hard day ; 
most of us, I think, turned in early. Now and then 
a light — a far tiny speck — appeared in one quarter 
or another — probably a signal beacon; that was all. 

But in the morning — it was soon after breakfast — 
a gray bank rose up out of the sea, and the word 
went round that it was Asia. That was a strange 
thing for a boy who had been brought up on the 
prairies of the Middle West — to look across the 
bow and see Asia coming up out of the sea. It 
brought back a small, one-room, white district school- 
house, dropped down on the bleak, level prairie, and 
geography-class of three, standing in a row and singing 
to the tune of Old Dan Tucker the rhymes of the 
continents : 

"Asia sixteen millions, 
The largest of the five grand divisions." 

It was not much of a rhyme, nor much of a tune, 
but there was a swing in the way we did it which fixed 
those facts for life. They came back now, and I had 
to get hold of myself a little to realize that this was 
the same Asia with all those square miles — the land 

146 



Into the Dardanelles 



of the Arabian Nights, of the apostles and the patri- 
archs — the wonderful country I had one day hoped to 
see. And presently we were off the Plains of Troy, pass- 
ing near where the ships of the Greeks lay anchored, 
all of which seemed very wonderful, too, I thought. 
We were in the Dardanelles, then, following the path 
of those first Argonauts who set sail with Jason, and 
of that later band who set out in the Quaker City, 
forty- two years ago. No lack of history and tradition 
and old association here. 

But how one's information does go to seed; all of 
us knew something, but none of us knew much. Not 
one of us knew positively whether the Hellespont 
was the same as the Dardanelles or as the Bosporus, 
and when, with the help of the guide-book, we decided 
that it was the former, we fell into other luminous 
debates as to where Leander swam it when he was 
courting Hero and where Xerxes built his bridge. 
The captain said that both these things took place at 
Abydos, which he pointed out to us, and then we were 
in trouble right away again as to whether this was 
the Abydos of Lord Byron's poem, or merely another 
town by the same name. At all events it was not 
much of a place. 

On the whole, the shores of the Dardanelles are 
mostly barren and uninteresting, with small towns 
here and there and fortifications. At one place some 
men came out in a boat and went through the for- 
mality of letting us enter the country. It did not 
seem much of a permission ; I could have given it my- 
self. But I suppose we had to have theirs ; otherwise 
they might have reached us with some kind of a gun. 

i47 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We entered the Sea of Marmora, passed a barren 
island or two; then the shores fell back beyond the 
horizon, and most of us put in the rest of the day 
pretending to read up on Constantinople. It was 
dark when we dropped anchor in the mouth of the 
Bosporus, and we were at dinner — a gala dinner, 




one's age, stated on oath, goes with a passport 



after which we danced. A third of the way around 
the world to the westward, in a country called America, 
a new President would be inaugurated to-morrow, and 
in the quiet dusk of our anchorage, with the scattered 
lights of Asia blinking across from one side and a 
shadowy, mysterious grove and a fairy-lighted city 
on the other, we celebrated that great occasion in the 

148 



Into the Dardanelles 



West and our arrival at the foremost mart of the 
East by dancing before Stamboul. 

That should have ended our day, but when we were 
about to break up, a boat-load or two of uniformed 
officials with distinctly Oriental faces and fezzes 
came aboard and opened business in the after cabin, 
going through our passports. Then for an hour or 
so there was most extraordinary medley of confused 
tongues. We had all our own kinds going at once and 
several varieties of Constant inoplese besides. And 
what an amazing performance it was, altogether — ■ 
something not to be equalled anywhere else on the 
earth, I imagine, unless in Russia — a sufficient com- 
mentary on the progress and enlightenment of these 
two laggard nations. 

Curious how some of our ladies hesitate about 
showing their passports. One's age, stated on oath, 
goes with a passport. 



KEYEFF 



XVIII 

A CITY OF ILLUSION 

I SUPPOSE there is no more beautiful city from 
the outside and no more disheartening city from 
the inside than Constantinople. From the outside 
it is all fairyland and enchantment; from the inside 
it is all grime and wretchedness. Viewed from the 
entrance of the Bosporus, through the haze of morn- 
ing, it is a vision. Viewed from a carriage driven 
through the streets it becomes a nightmare. If one 
only might see it as we did — at sunrise, with the 
minarets and domes lifting from the foliage, all aglow 
with the magic of morning — and then sail away from 
that dream spectacle, his hunger unsatisfied, he would 
hold at least one supreme illusion in his heart. 

For that is what it is — just an illusion — the most 
superb fantasy in the whole world. We left anchorage 

150 



A City of Illusion 



soon after sunrise and moved over abreast of Galata 
a little below the bridge that crosses the Golden Horn 
and connects this part of Constantinople with Stam- 
boul. We are lying now full length against the street, 
abreast of it, where all day long a soiled, disordered 
life goes on. It is a perpetual show, but hardly a 
pleasing one. It is besmirched and raucous; it is 
wretched. 

Hawkers, guides, beggars, porters weave in and 
out and mingle vociferously. To leave the ship is 
to be assailed on every side. Across the street is a 
row of coffee-houses where unholy music and singing 
keep up most of the time. Also, there are dogs, 
scores of them — a wolfish breed — and they are seldom 
silent. This is the reverse of the picture. As the 
outside is fairyland, so this is inferno. 

We battled our way to our carriages and drove 
across the bridge to Stamboul. Perhaps it would 
be better there. But that was a mistake — it was 
worse. We entered some narrow, thronging streets 
— a sort of general market, I should say — that fairly 
reeked with offal. We saw presently that nearly 
everybody wore rubbers, or stilted shoes — wooden 
sandal things, with two or three inches of heel and 
sole — and we understood why ; it was to lift them out 
of the filth. I have had dreams where, whichever 
way I turned, lay ordure and corruption, with no way 
out on any side. Such dreams were hardly worse 
than this. A passenger of our party — a lady — said 
afterwards : 

"When we drove through those streets I felt as 
if I had died and gone to hell." 

151 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Yet on the whole, I think hell would be cleaner. 
I am sure it would not smell so. I have no special 
preference for brimstone, but I would have welcomed 
it as we drove through those Constantinople streets. 

I know what they smell like; I can describe it 
exactly: they smell like a garbage -can. Not the 
average garbage -can — fairly fresh and leading the 
busy life — but an old, opulent, tired garbage-can — 
one that has been filled up and overlooked, in August. 
Now and then at home a can like that gets into the 
garbage-wagon, and when that wagon comes along 
the street on a still summer morning it arrests atten- 
tion. I have seen strong men turn pale and lovely 
women totter when that can went by. 

It would have no distinction in Constantinople. 
The whole city is just one vast garbage-can, and old — 
so old — why, for a thousand years or more they have 
been throwing stuff into the streets for the dogs to 
eat up, and the dogs can't eat some things, and so — 

Never mind; enough is enough; but if ever I get 
home, and if ever I want to recall vividly this vision 
of the East, I shall close my eyes when that garbage- 
wagon drives by, and once more the panaroma — 
panorama, I mean — of these thronging streets will 
unfold ; I shall be transported once more to the heart 
of this busy city ; I shall see again all the outlandish 
dress, all the strange faces, all the mosques and 
minarets, all the magic of the Orient, and I shall say, 
'This is it — this is the spicy East — this is Constanti- 
nople — Allah is indeed good!" 

It was at the entrance of the mosque of St. Sophia 
— a filthy entrance through a sort of an alley — that 

152 



A City of Illusion 



we heard our first cry of " Baksheesh !" — a plaintive 
cry from a pretty, pathetic little girl who clung to us, 
and called it over and over like the cry of a soul 
being dragged to perdition — " Bak-she-e-e-s/t / Bak- 
sh-e-e-e-sh!" a long-drawn-out wail. Not one of us 
who would not have given her freely had we not 
known that to do so would be to touch off the cyclone 
— the cloud of vultures hovering on the outskirts. 
One's heart grows hard in the East; it has to. 

At the door of the mosque there was a group of 
creatures who put slippers on us and made a pretence 
of tying the wretched things. They didn't do it, of 
course, and one had to slide and skate and straddle to 
keep from losing them — which thing would be a fearful 
desecration — we being ' 'Christian dogs." The Apos- 
tle in those slippers, skating and straddling and 
puffing his way through St. Sophia's was worth 
coming far to see. 

It is a mighty place, a grand place, but it has been 
described too often for me to attempt the details here. 
It is very, very old, and they have some candles there 
ten feet high and ten inches through (they look exact- 
ly like smooth marble columns and make the place 
very holy) , and there are some good rugs on the floor. 
Several of our party who are interested in such things 
agreed that the rugs are valuable, though they are 
laid crooked, as they all point toward Mecca, whereas 
the mosque, originally a Christian church, stands with 
the points of the compass. 

It has been built and rebuilt a good many times. 
The Emperor Justinian was its last great builder, 
and he robbed the ruins of Ephesus and Baalbec of 

i53 



The Ship -Dwellers 



certain precious columns for his purpose. On Christ- 
mas Day, 537 a.d., he finished and dedicated his work. 
Altogether he had spent five million dollars on the 
undertaking and had nearly bankrupted the empire. 
Nine hundred years later the Turks captured Con- 
stantinople, and Mohammed II., with drawn sword, 
rode into St. Sophia's and made the bloody handprint 
which remains the Moslem ruler's sign-manual to this 
day. They showed us the print, but I don't think it 
is the same one. It may be, but I don't think so — 
unless Mohammed was riding a camel. 

Some kind of ceremony was in progress when we 
arrived, but as usual in such places, we did not mind. 
We went right in just the same, and our guides, too, 
and we talked and pointed and did what we could to 
break up the services. Old turbaned sons of the 
Prophet were kneeling and bowing and praying here 
and there, and were a good deal in the way. Some- 
times we fell over them, but we were charitably dis- 
posed and did not kick them — at least, I didn't, and 
I don't think an} r of the party did. We might kick 
a dog — kick at him, I mean — if we tripped over one, 
but we do not kick a Moslem — not a live one. We 
only take his picture and step on him and muss him 
up, and make a few notes and go. 

I have been wondering what would happen to a 
party of tourists — Moslems, for instance — who broke 
into an American church during services, with guides 
to point and explain, and stared at the people who 
were saying their prayers, and talked them over as if 
they were wax figures. An American congregation 
would be annoyed by a mob like that, and would 

i54 



A City of Illusion 



remove it and put it in the calaboose. But then such 
things wouldn't happen in America. We have cowed 
our foreign visitors. Besides, there is nothing in an 
American church that a foreigner would care to see. 

We went to other mosques: to Suleiman, to Ahmed, 
to the "Pigeon" mosque with its gentle birds that 
come in clouds to be fed, but there is a good deal of 
sameness in these splendid edifices. Not that they 
are alike, but they seem alike, with their mellow lights, 
their alcoves and sacred sanctuaries; their gigantic 
wax candles; their little Turkeys — Turkish boys, I 
mean — rocking and singing the Koran, learning to be 
priests. And everywhere, whether it be prayer-time 
or not, there were old bearded men prostrated in 
worship or bowed in contemplation. Quite frequently 
we sat down on these praying men to rest a little, but 
they were too absorbed to notice it. 

There were no women in the mosques. The men 
supply the souls and the religion for the Turkish 
household. A woman has no use for a soul in Turkey. 
She wouldn't know what to do with it, and it would 
only make her trouble. She is allowed to pretend 
she has one, however, and to go to mosque now and 
then, just as we allow children to play "store" or 
"keeping-house." But it's make believe. She really 
hasn't any soul — everybody knows that. 

Constantinople is full of landmarks that perpetuate 
some memory — usually a bloody one — of the Janiz- 
aries. Every little while our guide would say, "This 
is where the Janizaries conquered the forces of 
Abdullah VI."; or "This is where the Janizaries 
overthrew and assassinated Mahmoud I."; or "This 

i55 



The Ship-Dwellers 



is where the Janizaries attacked the forces of His 
Sacred Majesty Bismillah II.," and everybody would 
say, "Oh, yes, of course," and we would go on. 

I said, "Oh yes, of course," with the others, which 
made it hard, later on, when I had worked up some 
curiosity on the subject, to ask who in the deuce 
the Janizaries were, anyway, and why they had been 
allowed to do all these bloody things unreproved. 

By and by we came to a place where the guide said 
that eight thousand of them had perished in the 
flames, and added that fifteen thousand more had been 
executed and twenty thousand banished. And we all 
said, "Oh yes, of course," again, and this time I 
meant it, for I thought that was about what would 
be likely to happen to persons with Janizary habits. 
Then I made a memorandum to look up that tribe 
when I got back to the ship. 

I have done so, now. The Janizaries were a body 
of military police, organized about 1330, originally 
of young Christians compelled to become Moslems. 
They became a powerful and terrible body, by and by, 
and conducted matters with a high hand. They 
were a wild, impetuous horde, and five hundred years 
of their history is full of assassinations of sultans and 
general ravage and bloodshed. In time they became 
a great deal more dangerous to Turkey than her 
enemies, but it was not until 1826 that a sultan, 
Mahmoud II., managed to arouse other portions of his 
army to that pitch of fanatical zeal which has made 
Janizaries exceedingly scarce ever since. I think our 
guide is a Janizary — he has the look — but I have 
decided not to mention the matter. 

156 



A City of Illusion 



We skated through mosques and the tombs of 
sultans and their wives most of the day, appraising 
the rugs and shawls and general bric-a-brac, and 
dropped into a museum — the best one, so far, in my 
opinion. They have a sarcophagus of Alexander 
there — that is, it was made for Alexander, though it 
is said he never slept in it, which is too bad, if true, 
for it is the most beautiful thing in the world — re- 
garded by experts as the finest existing specimen of 
Greek art. We lingered a long time about that ex- 
quisite gem — long for us — and bought photographs 
of it when we came away. Then we set out for the 
Long Street of Smells, crossed the Galata bridge, and 
were at the ship — home. 

We have only made a beginning of Constantinople, 
for we are to be here several days. But if it is all 
like to-day I could do with less of it. I have got 
enough of that smell to last a good while, and of the 
pandemonium that reigns in this disordered aggrega- 
tion of thoroughfares, humanity and buildings — this 
weird phantasmagoria miscalled a city. Through my 
port-hole, now — I am on the street side — there comes 
the most devilish concatenation of sounds: dogs 
barking and yelping, barbaric singing, wild mandolin 
music, all mingled with the cries of the hawkers and 
street arabs, and when I reflect that this is the real 
inwardness of that wonder dream we saw at sunrise, 
I am filled with a far regret that we could not have 
satisfied ourselves with that vision of paradise and 
sailed away. 
11 



XIX 



THE TURK AND SOME OF HIS PHASES 

IF one wants to get a fair idea of the mixed popu- 
lation of Constantinople, when the city's phantas- 
magoric life is in full swing, he may walk slowly 
across the Galata bridge, or he may stand still and 
watch the kaleidoscope revolve. Every costume, 
every color and kind of fabric, every type of Oriental 
will be represented there. It is a wild fancy-dress 
parade let loose — only that most of the bizarre cos- 
tumes are rather dingy and have the look of be- 
longing to their wearers, which is less likely to be 
so on an artificial occasion. 

The red fez predominates as to head-gear, and san- 
guinary waves of them go by. But there is every 
manner of turban, too, and the different kinds are 
interesting. Some of them are bound with rope or 
cord; some with twisted horsehair (those are Be- 
douins, I believe) ; some are wound with white muslin 
— these are worn by priests — and some are wound or 
bound with green, which indicates that the wearer is 
a descendant of Mohammed himself — that is, a "Son 
of the Prophet." The Prophet seems to have a good 
many descendants — not so many as Israel had in the 
same length of time, but still an industrious showing. 

One might suppose that these wearers of the green 
turban would be marked for special honor, and per- 

158 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



haps they are, but by no means are they all men of 
leisure. I saw one "wearer of the green" tooling a 
tram to the Seven Towers, and another son of the 
Prophet — a venerable man — bowed beneath a great 
box until his white beard and the rear elevation of 
his trousers nearly dragged in the dust. 

I think, by-the-way, I am more interested in the 
Turkish trousers than in any other article of national 
dress. They are rather short as to leg, but what they 
lack in length they make up in width and general 
amplitude. There is enough goods in the average 
pair of Turkish trousers to make a whole suit of clothes 
with material left for repairs. They are ridiculous 
enough from the front and the rear, but I rather like 
a side view best. The long after-part has such a 
drooping pendulous swing to it, and one gets the 
full value of the outline in profile and can calculate 
just what portion of it is occupied by the owner, and 
can lose himself in speculation as to what the rest is 
for. I like freedom and comfort well enough, too, in 
my clothes, but I would not be willing to sacrifice in 
the length of my trousers for the sake of that laundry- 
bag effect in the rear. I can admire it, though, and 
I do, often. 

At the Stamboul end of the Galata bridge is the 
most picturesque group, I believe, in the Orient. A 
coffee-house is there, and in front of it all the picture 
types of the East are gathered, with not a single Cau- 
casian face or dress. When I used to look at the 
gorgeously extravagant costumes and the flowing 
beards and patriarchal faces of the paintings and 
illustrations of the East, I said: "No, they do not 

i59 



The Ship -Dwellers 



really exist. They may have done so once, but not 
to-day. I have seen the Indian of my own country in 
his native sage-brush, and he is no longer the Indian 
of the pictures. His dress is adulterated with ready- 
made trousers and a straw hat; his face is mixed in 
color and feature; with the Orient it must be the 
same." 

I was mistaken. All the picture people are collected 
here, and more than picture ever saw. No sober 
imagination could conceive the scene at the end of 
the Galata bridge. To present it a painter would 
have to inebriate himself, spill his colors all about 
the place and wind up with the jimjams. What 
do these people do there? They indulge in keyeff. 
There is no English word for keyeff — no word in any 
language, probably, except Turkish. It is not done 
in any other language. Keyeff is a condition of pure 
enjoyment, unimpaired even by thought. Over his 
coffee and nargileh the Turk will sit for hours in a 
thought- vacancy which the Western mind can compre- 
hend no more than it can grasp the fourth dimension. 
It is not contemplation — that would require mental 
exercise. It is absence of thought — utter absence of 
effort — oblivion — the condition for which the Western 
mind requires chloroform. 

From the end of the Galata bridge the thronged 
streets diverge, and into these a motley procession 
flows. Men of every calling under the sun — mer- 
chants, clerks, mechanics, laborers, peddlers, beggars, 
bandits — all men — or nearly all, for the Mohammedan 
woman mostly bides at home. 

It is just as well that she does, if one may judge 

1 60 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



from the samples. She is not interesting, I think. 
She may be, but my opinion is the other way. She 
dresses in a sort of domino, usually of dingy goods, 
her feet and ankles showing disreputable stockings 
and shoes. Even the richest silk garments, when 
worn by women — those one sees on the street — have a 
way of revealing disgusting foot-gear and hosiery. 
No, the Mohammedan woman is not interesting and 
she has no soul. I believe the Prophet decided that, 
and I agree with him. If she had one — a real femi- 
nine soul — she would be more particular about these 
details. 

The Turk is a dingy person altogether, and his city 
is unholy in its squalor. Yet the religion of these 
people commands cleanliness. Only the command 
was not clear enough as to terms. The Prophet 
bade his followers to be as cleanly as possible. There 
was latitude in an order like that, and they have been 
widening it ever since. I don't believe they are as 
"clean as possible." They pray five times a day, 
and they wash before prayer, but they wash too little 
and pray too much for the best results. I mean so 
far as outward appearance is concerned. Very likely 
their souls are perfect. 

At all events they are sober. The Prophet com- 
manded abstinence, and I saw no drunkenness. There 
are no saloons in Constantinople. One may buy 
"brandy-sticks" — canes with long glass phials con- 
cealed in them and a tiny glass for tippling — though 
I suspect these are sold mostly to visitors. 

You are in the business part of Constantinople as 
soon as you leave the bridge — in the markets and 

161 



The Ship -Dwellers 



shops, and presently in the bazaars. The streets are 
only a few feet wide, and are swarming with men and 
beasts of burden, yet carriages dash through, and the 
population falls out of the way, cursing the ' ' Christian 
dogs," no doubt, in the case of tourists. Yet let a 
carriage but stop and there is eager attention on 
every hand — a lavish willingness to serve, to dance 
attendance, to grovel, to do anything that will bring 
return. 

The excursionist, in fact, presently gets an idea that 
these people are conducting a sort of continuous 
entertainment for his benefit — a permanent World's 
Fair Midway Plaisance, as it were, where curious 
wares and sights are arranged for his special diversion. 
He is hardly to be blamed for this notion. He sees 
every native ready to jump to serve him — to leave 
everything else for his pleasure. The shopkeeper will 
let a native customer wait and fume till doomsday 
as long as the tourist is even a prospect. The native 
piastre is nothing to him when American gold is in 
sight. That is what he lives for by day and dreams 
of by night. He will sweat for it, lie for it, steal for 
it, die for it. It is his life, his hope, his salvation. 
He will give everything but his immortal soul for the 
gold of the West, and he would give that too, if it 
would bring anything. 

Most places along the Mediterranean deal in mixed 
moneys, but compared with Constantinople the finan- 
cial problem elsewhere is simple. Here the traveller's 
pocket is a medley of francs, lire, crowns, piastres, 
drachmas, marks, and American coins of various 
denominations.- He tries feebly to keep track of 

162 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



table values, but it is no use. The crafty shopkeepers, 
who have all the world's monetary lore at their finger- 
tips, rob him every time they make change, and the 
more he tries to figure the more muddled he gets, 
until he actually can't calculate the coin of his own 
realm. 

As for Turkish money, in my opinion it is worth 
nothing whatever. It is mostly a lot of tinware and 
plated stuff, and, the plating is worn off, and the 
hieroglyphics, and it was never anything more than 
a lot of silly medals in the beginning. Whenever I 
get any of it I work it off on beggars as quickly as 
possible for baksheesh, and I always feel guilty, and 
look the other way and sing a little to forget. 

Nobody really knows what any of those Turkish 
metallic coins are supposed to be worth. One of 
them will pay for a shine, but then the shine isn't 
worth anything, either, so that is no basis of value. 
There is actually no legal tender in Turkey. How 
could there be, with a make-believe money like that ? 

Speaking of bootblacks, they all sit in a row at the 
other end of the Galata bridge, and they go to sleep 
over your shoes and pretend to work on them and take 
off the polish you gave them yourself in the morning. 
They have curious-looking boxes, and their work is as 
nearly useless as any effort, if it is that, I have ever 
known. 

I have been trying for a page or two to say some- 
thing more about the streets of Constantinople, and 
now I've forgotten what it was I wanted to say. 
Most of them are not streets at all, in fact, but alleys, 
wretched alleys — some of them roofed over — and as 

163 



The Ship -Dwellers 



you drive through them your face gets all out of 
shape trying to fit itself to the sights and smells. I 
remember now; I wanted to mention the donkeys — 
the poor, patient little beasts of burden that plod 
through those thoroughfares, weighed down with 
great loads of brick and dirt and wood and every 
sort of heavy thing, enough to make a camel sway- 
backed, I should think. They are the gentlest 
creatures alive, and the most imposed upon. If Mo- 
hammed provided a heaven for the donkeys, I hope 
it isn't the one the Turks go to. 

Then there are the fountains — that is, the public 
watering-places. They are nearly all carved in relief 
and belong to an earlier period, when art here was 
worth something. Here and there is a modern one — 
gaudy, tinsel, wretched. 

But one has to stop a minute to remember that these 
old streets are not always occupied by the turbans 
and fezzes of the unspeakable Turk. Constantinople 
was Greek in the beginning, founded away back, six 
hundred years or more B.C., and named Byzantium, 
after one Byzas, its founder. The colony had started 
to settle several miles farther up the Golden Horn, 
when a crow came along and carried off a piece of 
their sacrificial meat. They were mad at first; but 
when they found he had dropped it over on Bosporus 
Point they concluded to take his judgment and settle 
there instead. 

Then came a good many changes. Persians and 
Greeks held the place by turns, and by and by it was 
allied to Rome. The Christian Emperor Constant ine 
made it his capital about 328 a.d. and called it New 

164 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



Rome. But the people wouldn't have that title. Con- 
stantine had rebuilt the city, and they insisted on 
giving it his name. So Constantinople it became and 
remained — the names Galata, Pera, Stamboul, and 
Skutari (accent on the "Sku ") being merely divisions, 
the last-named on the Asiatic side. 

It was not until eleven hundred years after Con- 
stantine that the Turkomans swarmed in and pos- 
sessed themselves of what had become a tottering 
empire. So the Turkish occupation is comparatively 
recent — only since 1453. 

Still, that is a good while ago, when one considers 
what has been done elsewhere. Christopher Colum- 
bus was playing marbles in Genoa, or helping his 
father comb wool, then. America was a place of 
wigwams — a habitation of Indian tribes. We have 
done a good deal in the four and a half centuries since 
— more than the Turk will do in four and a half 
million years. The Turk is not an express train. He 
is not even a slow freight. He is not a train at all, 
but an old caboose on the hind end of day before 
yesterday. By the way, I know now why these old 
cities have still older cities buried under them. They 
never clean the streets, and a city gets entirely cov- 
ered up at last with dirt. 

I have been wanting to speak of the dogs of Con- 
stantinople ever since I began this chapter. They have 
been always in my mind, but I wanted to work off 
my ill-nature, first, on the Turk. For I have another 
feeling for the dogs — a friendly feeling — a sympathetic 
feeling — an affectionate feeling. 

165 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Every morning at four o'clock the dogs of Con- 
stantinople turn their faces toward Mecca and howl 
their heart-break to the sky. At least, I suppose 
they turn toward Mecca — that being the general habit 
here when one has anything official to give out. I 
know they howl and bark and make such a disturbance 
as is heard nowhere else on earth. In America, two or 
three dogs will keep a neighborhood awake, but im- 
agine a vast city of dogs all barking at once — forty 
or fifty dogs to the block, counting the four sides! 
Do you think you could sleep during that morning 
orison? If you could, then you are sound-proof. 

I have said that I have an affection for the dogs, but 
not at that hour. It develops later, when things have 
quieted down, and I have had breakfast and am con- 
sidering them over the ship's side. There is a band 
of them owns this section of the water-front, and 
they are worth studying. 

They are not as unsightly and as wretched as I ex- 
pected to find them. Life for them is not a path of 
roses, but neither is it a trail of absolute privation. 
They live on refuse, and there is plenty of refuse. 
They are in fair condition, therefore, as to flesh, and 
they do not look particularly unhappy, though they 
are dirty enough, and sometimes mangy and moth- 
eaten and tufty ; but then the Turks themselves are 
all of these things, and why should the dogs be other- 
wise? 

The type of these dogs impresses me. They have 
reverted to the original pattern — they are wolf-dogs. 
They vary only in color — usually some tone of grizzly 
gray — and not widely in that. They have returned to 

166 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



race — to the old wild breed that made his bed in the 
grass and revolved three times before he was ready to 
lie down. One might expect them to be ugly and 
dangerous, but they are not. They are the kindest, 
gentlest members of the dog family notwithstanding 
the harsh treatment they receive, and the most intelli- 
gent. No one really human can study them without 
sympathy and admiration. 

I have watched these dogs a good deal since we 
came here, and a lady of Constantinople, the wife of a 
foreign minister, has added largely to my information 
on the subject. 

They are quite wonderful in many ways. They 
have divided themselves into groups or squads, and 
their territory into districts, with borders exactly 
defined. They know just about how much substance 
each district will supply and the squads are not allowed 
to grow. There is a captain to each of these com- 
panies, and his rule is absolute. When the garbage 
from each house is brought out and dumped into the 
street, he oversees the distribution and keeps order. 
He keeps it, too. There is no fighting and very little 
discord, unless some outlaw dog from a neighboring 
group attempts to make an incursion. Then there is 
a wild outbreak, and if the dog escapes undamaged 
he is lucky. 

The captain of a group is a sultan with the power 
of life and death over his subjects. When puppies 
come along he designates the few — the very few — that 
are to live, and one mother nurses several of the re- 
duced litters — the different mothers taking turns. 
When a dog gets too old to be useful in the strenuous 

167 



The Ship -Dwellers 



round — when he is no longer valuable to the band — he 
is systematically put out of the way by starvation. A 
day comes when the captain issues some kind of an 
edict that he is no longer to have food. From that 
moment, until his death, not a morsel passes his lips. 
With longing eyes he looks at the others eating, but 
he makes no attempt to join them. Now and again 
a bit of something falls his way. The temptation is 
too strong — he reaches toward the morsel. The 
captain, who overlooks nothing, gives a low growl. 
The dying creature shrinks back without a murmur. 
He knows the law. Perhaps he, too, was once a 
captain. 

The minister's wife told me that she had tried to 
feed one of those dying dogs, but that even when the 
food was placed in front of him he would only look 
pleadingly at the captain and refuse to touch it. She 
brought him inside, at last, where he was no longer 
under that deadly surveillance. He ate then, but 
lived only a little while. Perhaps it was too late; 
perhaps the decree was not to be disobeyed, even 
there. 

As a rule, it is unwise to show kindness or the least 
attention to these dogs, she said. The slightest word 
or notice unlocks such a storehouse of gratitude and 
heart-hunger in those poor creatures that one can 
never venture near that neighborhood again without 
being fairly overwhelmed with devotion. Speak a 
word to one of them and he will desert his com- 
panions and follow you for miles. 

The minister's wife told how once a male member 
of her household had shown some mark of attention 

1 68 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



to one of the dogs of their neighborhood group. A 
day or two later she set out for a walk, carrying her 
parasol, holding it downward. Suddenly she felt it 
taken from her hand. Looking down, she saw a dog 
walking by her side, carrying it. It was the favored 
animal,, trying to make return to any one who came 
out of that heavenly house. 

She told me how in the winter the dogs pile up in 
pyramids to keep warm, and how those underneath, 
when they have smothered as long as they can, will 
work out and get to the top of the heap and let the 
others have a chance to get warm and smothered too. 

Once, when some excavations were going on in her 
neighborhood the dogs of several bands, made kin by a 
vigorous touch of nature, cold, had packed themselves 
into a sort of tunnel which the workmen had made. 
One dog who had come a little late was left outside. 
He made one or two efforts to get a position, but it 
was no use. He reflected upon the situation and 
presently set up a loud barking. That was too much 
for those other dogs. They came tumbling out to see 
what had happened, but before they had a chance to 
find out, the late arrival had slipped quietly in and 
established himself in the warmest place. 

Once a pasha visited a certain neighborhood in Pera, 
and the dogs kept him awake. In his irritation he 
issued an order that the dogs of that environment 
should be killed. The order was carried out, and for 
a day and a night there was silence there. But then 
the word had gone forth that a section of rich territory 
had been vacated, and there was a rush for it that was 
like the occupation of the Oklahoma strip. 

169 



The Ship -Dwellers 



There was trouble, too, in establishing the claim and 
electing officers. No such excitement and commotion 
and general riot had ever been known in that street 
before. It lasted two days and nights. Then every- 
thing was peaceable enough. Captains had fought 
their way to a scarred and limping victory. Claims 
had been duly surveyed and distributed. The pasha 
had retired permanently from the neighborhood. 

It is against the law for the ordinary citizen to kill 
one of the dogs. They are scavengers, and the law 
protects them. One may kick and beat and scald and 
maim them, and the Turk has a habit of doing these 
things ; but he must not kill them — not unless he is a 
pasha. And, after all, the dogs own Constantinople — 
the pariah dogs, I mean; there are few of the other 
kind. One seldom sees a pet dog on the streets. The 
pariah dogs do not care for him. They do not attack 
him, they merely set up a racket which throws that 
pet dog into a fever and tills him with an abiding 
love of home. But I am dwelling too long on this 
subject. I enjoy writing about these wonderful dogs. 
They interest me. 

Perhaps the ' ' Young Turks ' ' will improve Constan- 
tinople. Already they have made the streets safer; 
perhaps they will make them cleaner. Also, they 
may improve the Turkish postal service. That would 
be a good place to begin, I should think. Constan- 
tinople has a native post-office, but it isn't worth any- 
thing. Anybody who wants a letter to arrive sends 
it through one of the foreign post-offices, of which each 
European nation supports one on its own account. To 
trust a letter to the Turkish post-office is to bid it a 

170 



The Turk and Some of His Phases 



permanent good-bye. The officials will open it for 
money first, and soak off the stamp afterward. If 
you inquire about it, they will tell you it was prob- 
ably seditionary and destroyed by the sultan's or- 
ders. Perhaps that will not be so any more. The 
sultan's late force of twenty thousand spies has been 
disbanded, and things to-day are on a much more 
liberal basis. Two royal princes came aboard our 
vessel to-day, unattended except by an old marshal 
— something which has never happened here before. 

These princes have been virtually in prison all their 
lives. Until very recently they had never left the 
palace except under guard. They had never been 
aboard a vessel until they came aboard the Kurfurst, 
and though grown men, they were like children in 
their manner and their curiosity. They had never 
seen a type-writer. They had never seen a steam- 
engine. Our chief engineer took them down among 
the machinery and they were delighted. They greeted 
everybody, saluted everybody, and drove away at 
last in their open victoria drawn by two white horses, 
with no outriders, no guards, no attendants of any 
kind except the old marshal — a thing which only a 
little while ago would not have been dreamed of as 
possible. 

Perhaps there is hope for Turkey, after all. 



XX 



ABDUL HAMID GOES TO PRAYER 

IT was on our second day in Constantinople that we 
saw the Selamlik — that is, the Sultan Abdul Hamid 
II. on his way to prayer. It was Friday, which is 
the Mohammedan Sunday, and the sultan, accord- 
ing to his custom, went to the mosque in state. The 
ceremony was, in fact, a grand military review, with 
twenty-five thousand soldiers drawn up on the hillside 
surrounding the royal mosque, and many bands of 
music ; the whole gay and resplendent with the varied 
uniforms of different brigades, the trappings of high 
officials, the flutter of waving banners, the splendor 
of royal cortege — all the fuss and fanfare of this fallen 
king. 1 

For Abdul Hamid is no longer monarch except by 
sufferance. A tyrant who in his time has ordered the 
massacre of thousands; has imprisoned and slain 
members of his own family; has sent a multitude to 
the Bosporus and into exile; has maintained in this 

1 Note — a year later. — The Selamlik here described was among 
the last of such occasions. A few weeks later, in April, 1909, 
Abdul Hamid regained a brief ascendancy, ordered the terrible 
massacres of Adana, and on April 27th was permanently de- 
throned. He was succeeded by his brother, Mehmed V., who 
attends mosque with little or no ceremony. Abdul meantime 
has retired to Salonica, where he is living quietly — as quietly as 
one may with seventeen favorite wives and the imminent pros- 
pect of assassination. 

172 



Abdul Hamid Goes to Prayer 



enlightened day a court and a rule of the Middle 
Ages — he is only a figurehead now, likely to be re- 
moved at a moment's warning. 

The Young Turk is in the saddle. Hamid 's force 
of twenty thousand spies has' been disbanded. Men- 
of-war lie in the Bosporus just under Yildiz, ready to 
open fire on that royal palace at the first sign of any 
disturbance there. The tottering old man is still 
allowed his royal guard, his harem, and this weekly 
ceremonial and display to keep up a semblance of 
imperial power. But he is only a make-believe king; 
the people know that, and he knows it, too, best of all. 

We had special invitations from the palace and a 
special enclosure from which to view the ceremony. 
We had cakes, too, and sherbet served while we 
waited — by the sultan's orders, it was said — but I 
didn't take any. I thought Abdul might have heard 
I didn't care for him and put poison in mine. That 
would be like him. 

I was tempted, though, for we had driven a long way 
through the blinding dust It was hot there, and 
we had to stand up and keep on standing up while all 
that great review got together and arranged and 
rearranged itself; while officials and black Nubian 
eunuchs, those sexless slaves of the harem, ran up and 
down, and men sanded the track — that is, the road 
over which his majesty was to drive — and did a hun- 
dred other things to consume time. 

One does not hurry the Orient — one waits on it. 
That is a useful maxim — I'm glad I invented it. I 
said it over about a hundred times while we stood 
there waiting for Abdul Hamid, who was dallying 
12 173 



The Ship -Dwellers 



with certain favorites, like as not, and remembering 
us not at all. 

It was worth seeing, though. Brigade after brigade 
swung by to the weird music of their bands — billow 
after billow of brown, red, and blue uniforms. The 
hillside became a perfect storm of fezzes; the tide of 
spectators rose till its waves touched the housetops. 

Still we waited and watched the clock on the mosque. 
Nobody can tell time by a Turkish clock, but there 
was some comfort in watching it. Presently an 
informing person at my side explained that Turkish 
chronology is run on an altogether different basis 
from ours. There are only three hundred and fifty- 
four days in a Turkish year, he said, which makes the 
seasons run out a good deal faster, so that it is usually 
about year after next in Turkey; but as it is only 
about day before yesterday by the clock, the balance 
is kept fairly even. 

He was a very entertaining person. Referring to 
the music, he said that once the sultan's special brass 
band had played before him so pleasingly that he 
ordered all their instruments filled with gold, which 
was well enough, except for the piccolo-player, who 
said: "Sire, I am left out of this reward." "Never 
mind," said the sultan, "your turn will come." And 
it did, next day, for the band played so badly that the 
sultan roared out: "Ram all their instruments down 
their throats," which was impossible, of course, except 
in the case of the piccolo-player. 

My entertainer said that formerly cameras were 
allowed at the Selamlik, but that an incident occurred 
which resulted in prohibiting cameras and all suspicious 

174 



Abdul Hamid Goes to Prayer 



articles. He said that a gentleman engaged a carriage 
for the Selamlik, and explained to the driver that he 
had invented a wonderful new camera — one that would 
take pictures in all the colors — and instructed him just 
how to work the machine. 

The gentleman had to make a train, he said, and 
couldn't wait for the sultan to arrive, but if the driver 
would press the button when the sultan reached a 
certain place the picture would take, after which the 
driver could bring the camera to the Pera Palace 
Hotel on a certain day and get a hundred piastres, 
a sum larger than the driver had ever owned at one 
time. Then the gentleman left in a good deal of a 
hurry, and the driver told all the other drivers about 
his good-fortune while they waited; and by and by, 
when the sultan came, and got just to the place where 
the gentleman had said, the driver pressed the button, 
and blew a hole seventy-five feet wide and thirty 
feet deep right on that spot, and it rained drivers and 
horses and fezzes and things for seven minutes. It 
didn't damage the sultan any, but it gave him a per- 
manent distaste for cameras and other suspicious 
objects. 

Laura, age fourteen, who had been listening to the 
story, said: 

"Did they do anything to the driver who did it?" 

"Yes; they gathered him up in a cigar box and 
gave him a funeral. No, the man didn't call for the 
camera." 

I am sorry I have kept the reader waiting for the 
Selamlik, but the sultan is to blame. One may not 
hurry a sultan, and one must fill in the time, somehow. 

i75 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Some carriages go by at last, and enter the mosque 
enclosure, but they do not contain the sultan, only 
some of his favorite wives, with those long black 
eunuchs running behind. Then there is a carriage 
with a little boy in it — the sultan's favorite son, it is 
said — the most beautiful child I ever saw. 

A blare of trumpets — all the bayonets straight up — 
a gleaming forest of them. Oh, what a bad time to 
fall out of a balloon! 

A shout from the troops — a huzzah, timed and per- 
functory, but general. Then men in uniform, walking 
ahead; a carriage with a splendid driver; a pale, 
bearded, hook-nosed old man with a tired, rather 
vacant face. Here and there he touches his forehead 
and his lips with his ringers, waving the imperial 
salute. For a moment every eye of that vast con- 
course is upon him — he is the one important bauble 
of that splendid setting. Then he has passed be- 
tween the gates and is gone. 

Thus it was that Sultan Abdul Hamid attended 
mosque. It seemed a good deal of fuss to make over 
an old man going to prayer. 

We drove from the Selamlik to the Dancing Der- 
vishes. I have always heard of them and now I 
have seen them. I am not sorry to have it over. 

Their headquarters are in a weather-beaten-frame- 
barn of a place, and we stood outside for a long time 
before the doors were open. Inside it was hot and 
close and crowded, and everybody twisted this way 
and that and stood up on things to get a look. I 
held two women together on one chair — they were 

176 



Abdul Hamid Goes to Prayer 



standing up — and I expected to give out any minute 
and turn loose a disaster that would break up the 
show. There wasn't anything to see, either; not a 
thing, for hours. 

We were in a sort of circular gallery and the dancing- 
floor was below. We could see squatted there a ring 
of men — a dozen or so bowed, solemn, abstracted 
high priests in gowns of different colors and tall 
fezzes. These were the dervishes, no doubt, but 
they didn't do anything — not a thing — and we didn't 
care to stare at them and at the dancing-floor and the 
rest of the suffering audience forever. 

Then we noticed in our gallery a little reserved 
section with some more abstracted men in gowns 
and fezzes, and after a long time — as much as a thou- 
sand years, I should think — there was an almost 
imperceptible movement in this reserved compart- 
ment, and one of the elect produced some kind of 
reed and began to blow a strain that must have been 
born when the woods were temples and the winds' 
were priests — it was so weirdly, mournfully enthral- 
ling. I could have listened to that music and for- 
gotten all the world if I hadn't been busy holding 
those two women on that chair. 

The perspiration ran down and my joints petrified 
while that music droned on and on. Then there was 
another diversion: a man got up and began to sing. 
I don't know why they picked that particular man — 
certainly not for his voice. It was Oriental singing — 
a sort of chanting monotone in a nasal pitch. Yet 
there was something wild and seductive about it — 
something mystical — and I liked it well enough. 

177 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Only I didn't want it to go on forever, situated as I 
was. I wanted the dancing to begin, and pretty soon, 
too. It didn't, however. Nothing begins soon in the 
Orient. 

But by-and-by, when that songster had wailed for 
as much as a week, those high priests on the dancing- 
floor began to show signs of life. They moved a little ; 
they got up ; they went through some slow evolutions 
— to limber themselves, perhaps — then they began to 
whirl. 

The dance is a religious rite, and it is supposed to 
represent the planets revolving about the sun. The 
dancers serve an apprenticeship of one thousand and 
one days, and they can whirl and keep on whirling 
forever without getting dizzy. The central figure, 
who represents the sun, has had the most practice, 
no doubt, for he revolves just twice as fast as the 
planets, who are ranged in two circles around him. 
His performance is really wonderful. I did not think 
so much of the others, except as to their ability to 
stand upright. I thought I could revolve as fast as 
they did, myself, and I would have given four dollars 
for a little freedom just then to try it. 

Would that constellation never run down? The 
satellites whirled on and on, and the high priest in the 
middle either got faster or I imagined it. Then at 
last they stopped — just stopped — that was all; only 
I let go of those two women then and clawed my way 
to fresh air. 

We went to the bazaars after that. There is 
where the Kurfiirster finds real bliss. He may talk 
learnedly of historic sites and rave over superb ruins 

178 



Abdul Humid Goes to Prayer 



and mosques and such things, when you drag him in 
carriages to see them. But only say the word bazaar 
to him and he will walk three miles to find it. To 
price the curious* things of the East; to barter and 
beat down; to walk away and come back a dozen 
times ; to buy at last at a third of the asking price — 
such is the passion that presently gets hold of the 
irresponsible tourist who lives on one ship and has 
a permanent state-room for his things. 

You should see some of those state-rooms! Jars, 
costumes, baskets, rugs, draperies, statuary — piled 
everywhere, hung everywhere, stowed everywhere — 
why, we could combine the stuff on this ship and open 
a floating bazaar that would be the wonder of the 
world. 

The bazaars of Constantinople are crowded together 
and roofed over, and there are narrow streets and 
labyrinthine lanes. One can buy anything there — 
anything Eastern: ornaments, inlaid work, silks, 
curious weapons, picture postals (what did those 
Quaker City pilgrims do without them?), all the wares 
of the Orient — he can get a good deal for a little if 
he is patient and unyielding — and he will be cheated 
every time he makes change. Never mind; one's 
experience is always worth something, and this par- 
ticular tariff is not likely to be high. 

We bought several things in Constantinople, but 
we did not buy any confections. The atmosphere 
did not seem suited to bonbons, and the places where 
such things were sold did not look inviting. Laura 
inspected the assortment and decided that the best 
Turkish Delight is made in America, and that Broad- 

179 



The Ship-Dwellers 



way is plenty far enough east for nougat. In one 
bazaar they had a marvellous collection of royal 
jewels: swords with incrusted handles ; caskets ''worth 
a king's ransom" — simply a mass of rubies, emeralds, 
and diamonds — half a barrel of such things, at least, 
but we didn't buy any of those goods, either. We 
would have done so, of course, only they were not 
for sale. 

We called at the bazaar of Far-away Moses, but 
he wasn't there. He died only a little while ago, and 
has gone to that grand bazaar of delight which the 
Mohammedans have selected as their heaven. 

As usual, Laura and I were the last to leave. We 
were still pulling over some things when our driver, 
whom we call Suleiman because he has such a holy, 
villanous look, came suddenly to the entrance, waving 
frantically. We started then and piled into our car- 
riage. The rest of our party were already off, and we 
set out helter-skelter after them, Suleiman probably be- 
lieving that the ship had its anchors up ready to sail. 

We were doing very well when right in front of a 
great arch one of our horses fell down. We had a 
crowd in a minute, and as it was getting dusk I can't 
say that I liked the situation. But Suleiman got the 
horse on his feet somehow, and we pushed along and 
once more entered that diabolical Street of Smells. 
It had been bad day by day, but nothing to what it 
was now. There were no lights, except an oil-lamp 
here and there; the place was swarming with hu- 
manity and dogs, general vileness permeating every- 
thing. The woman who thought she had died and 
gone to hell could be certain of it here. 

1 80 



Abdul Hamid Goes to Prayer 



It seemed that we would never get out of that 
street. We had to go slower, and the horrible gully 
was eternal in its length. How far ahead our party 
was we did not know. We were entirely alone 
in that unholy neighborhood with our faithful 
Suleiman, who looked like a cutthroat, anyhow. I 
wished he didn't look like that, and Laura said 
quietly that she never expected to see the light of 
another dawn. 

Bumpety-bump — bark, howl, clatter, darkness, 
stench — rolling and pitching through that mess, 
and then, heavenly sight — a vision of lights, water, 
the end of the Galata bridge! 

We made our way through the evening jam and the 
wild bedlam at the other end, crossing a crimson tide 
of fezzes, to reach the one clean place we have seen 
in Constantinople — that is, the ship. The ship is 
clean — too clean, we think, when we hear them scrub- 
bing and mopping and thumping the decks at four 
o'clock in the morning, just about dog-howling time. 
Which brings me to a specimen of our ship German — 
American German — produced by a gentle soul named 
Fosdick, of Ohio. He used it on the steward after 
being kept awake by the ship-cleaning. This is what 
he said: 

" Vas in damnation is das noise ? How can I schlaff 
mit das hellgefired donner-wetter going on oben mine 
head?" 

That is the sort of thing we can do when we get 
really stirred up. It is effective, too. There was no 
unseemly noise this morning. 



XXI 



LOOKING DOWN ON YILDIZ 

HERETOFORE, during our stay here, whenever 
any one happened to mention the less attractive 
aspects of Constantinople, I have said: 

''Yes, the city is pretty bad, but I'll wager the 
country is a dream. Remember Algiers and her 
suburban villas ? It will be the same here." 

I do not say that any more, now that we have been 
to the country. We went over to Skutari (Asiatic 
Constantinople) this morning, and took carriages to 
Bulgurlu Mountain, which overlooks all the city and 
a vast stretch of country. It is a good view, but it 
should be, considering what it costs to get there — in 
wear and tear, I mean. 

Of all villanous roads, those outside Skutari are 
the most depraved. They are not roads at all, 
but just washes and wallows and ditches and stone 
gullies. I have seen bad roads in Virginia — roads 
surveyed by George Washington, and never touched 
since — but they were a dream of luxury as compared 
with these of Turkey. Our carriages billowed and 
bobbed and pitched and humped themselves until I 
got out and walked to keep from being lamed for life. 

And then the houses — the villas I had expected 
to see; dear me, how can I picture those cheap, ugly, 
unpainted, overdecorated architectural crimes ? They 

182 



Looking Down on Tildvz 



are wooden and belong to the jig-saw period gone 
mad. They suggest an owner who has been too busy 
saving money for a home to acquire any taste ; who 
has spent his savings for lumber and trimmings and 
has nothing left for paint. Still, he managed to re- 
serve enough to put iron bars on his windows — that is, 
on part of the house — the harem — every man becom- 
ing his own jailer, as it were. I remarked: 

' ' I suppose that is to keep the neighbors from steal- 
ing their wives." 

But the Horse-Doctor — wiser and more observant — 
said: 

"No, it is to keep a neighbor from breaking in and 
leaving another." 

Standing on the top of Bulgurlu — looking down 
on the Bosporus and the royal palaces — the wife 
of a foreign minister told us something of the history 
that has been written there : 

When Abdul Aziz, in 1876, became Abdul "as was " 1 
(his veins were opened with a penknife, I believe), one 
Murad, his nephew, an educated and travelled prince, 
came into power. But Murad was for progress — 
bridges and railroads — so Murad retired to Cheragan 
Palace, where for thirty-two years he sat at a window 
and looked out on a world in which he had no part, 
while Abdul Hamid II. reigned in his stead. Murad 
was wise and gentle, and did not reproach Abdul, 
who came to him now and again for advice concerning 
matters of state. 

But Murad was fond of watching the' people from 
his window — excursion parties such as ours, and the 

1 Ship-joke. 

183 



The Ship -Dwellers 



like — and these in turn used to look up at Murad's 
window; which things in time came to Abdul Hamid's 
ears. Then Abdul decided that this indulgence was 
not good for Murad — nor for the people. Thirty-two 
years was already too long for that sort of thing. So 
Murad's face disappeared from the window, and it was 
given out that he had died — the bulletin did not say 
what of, but merely mentioned that it had been a 
"general death" — that is to say, a natural death, 
under the circumstances — the kind of death a retired 
Sultan is likely to die. And Abdul mourned for 
Murad many days, and gave him a costly funeral. 

That was Abdul's way. He was always a good 
brother — always a generous soul — according to a 
guide-book published in Constantinople during the 
time when there were twenty thousand secret agents 
inspecting such things. The author of that book 
wanted those twenty thousand secret agents to tell 
Abdul how good and gentle the book said he was; 
otherwise, the modest and humble Abdul might not 
remember. Besides, that author did not wish to dis- 
appear from among his friends and be sewed up in 
a sack and dropped into the Bosporus some quiet 
evening. But I wander — I always wander. 

Abdul Hamid is said to be affectionate with his 
family — all his family — and quick — very quick — that 
is to say, impulsive. He is a crack shot, too, and keeps 
pistols on his dressing-table. One day he saw one of 
his little sons — or it may have been one of his little 
daughters (it isn't always easy to tell them apart, 
when they are so plentiful and dress a good deal alike), 
but anyway this was a favorite of Abdul's — he saw 

184 



Looking Down on Tildiz 



this child handling one of his pistols, perhaps playfully 
pointing it in his direction. 

Hamid didn't tell the child to put the weapon 
down, and then lecture him. No, he couldn't scold 
the child, he was too impulsive for that — and quick, 
as I have mentioned. He drew a revolver of his own 
and shot the child dead. There were rumors of plots 
floating around the palace just then, and Hamid 
wasn't taking any chances. It must have made his 
heart bleed to have to punish the child in that sud- 
den way. 

But by-and-by the times were out of joint for sul- 
tans. A spirit of discontent was spreading — there was 
a cry for freer government. Enver Bey and Niazi 
Bey, those two young officers whose names are being 
perpetuated by male babies in every Turkish house- 
hold, disguised themselves as newsboys or bootblacks, 
and going among the people of the streets whispered 
the gospel of freedom. Then one day came the up- 
heaval of which all the world has read. ' Abdul Hamid 
one morning, looking out of his window in Yildiz 
Palace, saw, lying in the Bosporus just below, the 
men-of-war which all the years of his reign had been 
turning to rust and wormwood in the Golden Horn. 

Abdul did not believe it at first. He thought he 
was just having one of those bad dreams that had 
pestered him now and then since spies and massacres 
had become unpopular. He pinched himself and 
rubbed his eyes, but the ships stayed there. Then 
he sent for the Grand Vizier. (At least, I suppose it 
was the Grand Vizier — that is what a sultan generally 
sends for in a case like that.) When he arrived the 

185 



The Ship -Jewellers 



Sultan was fingering his artillery and looking dan- 
gerous. 

"What in h — that is, Allah be praised, but why, 
sirrah, are those ships lying down there?" he roared. 

The G. V. was not full of vain knowledge. 

"I — I really don't know, Your Majesty," he said, 
soothingly. "I will go and see." 

He was standing near the door and dodged as he 
went out. He did not come back. When he had in- 
quired about the ships he decided not to seek Abdul 
himself, but to send a man — a cheap man — to tell 
him about it. This was just a dull fellow with not 
much politeness and no imagination. 

"The ships are there by the order of the Minister 
of Marine, Your Majesty," he said. 

Abdul was so astonished that he forgot to slay the 
fellow. 

"Bring the Minister of Marine! " he gasped, when at 
last he could catch his breath. 

The Minister' of Marine came — a new minister — one 
of the Young Turk Party. He was polite, but not 
upset by the Sultan's emotion. When Abdul de- 
manded the reason why the old ships had been fur- 
bished up and brought down into the Bosporus, he 
replied that they were there by his orders, and added: 

"We think they look better there, Your Majesty, 
as in the old days." 

"But, by the beard of the Prophet, I will not have 
them there ! Take them away ! ' ' 

"Your Majesty, it grieves me to seem discourteous, 
not to say rude, but those ships are to remain at their 
present anchorage. It grieves me still further to 

186 



Looking Down on Tildiz 



appear to be firm, not to say harsh, but if there is any 
show of resistance in this neighborhood they have 
orders to open fire on Your Majesty's palace." 

Abdul took a chair and sat down. His jaw dropped, 
and he looked at the Minister of Marine a good while 
without seeming to see him. Then he got up and 
tottered over to the window and gazed out on those 
ships lying just below, on the Bosporus. By-and-by, 
he went to a little ornamental table and took a pen 
and some paper and wrote an order in this wise : 

Owing to my declining years and my great burdens of 
responsibility, it is my wish that in future all matters per- 
taining to the army and navy be under the supervision of 
the Secretary of War and the Minister of Marine. 

Abdul Hamid, Kahn II. 
Son of the Prophet — Shadow of God, etc., etc. 

At all events, that was the purport of it. In 
reality, it was a succession of wriggly marks which 
only a Moslem could read. Never mind, it was a 
graceful surrender. 

There is a wonderful old Moslem cemetery near 
Bulgurlu — one of the largest in the world and the 
most thickly planted. It is favored by Moslems 
because it is on the side of the city nearest Mecca, 
and they are lying there three deep and have over- 
flowed into the roads and byways. Their curiously 
shaped and elaborately carved headstones stand as 
thick as grain — some of them crowned with fezzes — 
some with suns — all of them covered with emblems 
and poetry and passages from the Koran. They 
are tumbled this way and that ; they are lying every- 

187 



The Ship -Dwellers 



where along the road; they have been built into the 
wayside walls. 

I wanted to carry away one of those tombstones — 
one of the old ones — and I would have done it if I 
had known enough Moslem to corrupt the driver. A 
thing like that would be worth st — adding to one's 
collection, I mean. The palace was full of great 
cypresses, too — tall, funereal trees — wonderfully im- 
pressive and beautiful. 

We drove back to Skutari and there saw our driver 
Suleiman for the last time. I had already tipped him 
at the end of each day, but I suppose he expected 
something rather unusual as a farewell token. Un- 
fortunately, I was low in fractional currency. I scrap- 
ed together all I had left — a few piastres — and handed 
them to him and turned quickly away. There came 
a sudden explosion as of a bomb. I did not look to 
see what it was — I knew. It was the bursting of 
Suleiman's heart. 

Up the Golden Horn in the afternoon, as far as the 
Sweet Waters of Europe. It is a beautiful sail, and 
there is a mosque where the ceremony of conferring 
the sword on a new Sultan is performed; also, a fine 
view across the Sweet Waters, with Jewish graveyards 
whitening the distant hills. But there was nothing 
of special remark — we being a little tired of the place 
by this time — except the homecoming. 

There were caiques lying about the little steamer- 
landing when we were ready to return, and Laura and 
I decided to take one of these down the Horn to the 
ship. The caique is a curiously shaped canoe-sort of 
a craft, and you have to get in carefully and sit still. 

188 




13 



The Ship -Dwellers 



But once in and seated, it moves as silently and 
smoothly as a gliding star. 

It was sunset, and the Golden Horn was true to its 
name. Ships at anchor, barges drifting up and down, 
were aglow with the sheen of evening — the water a 
tawny, molten flood, the still atmosphere like an im- 
palpable dust of gold. Caiques carrying merchants 
to their homes somewhere along the upper shores 
were burnished w T ith the aureate hue. Domes and 
minarets caught and reflected the wonder of it — the 
Galata bridge ahead of us had become such a span 
as might link the shores of the River of Peace. 

Once more Constantinople was a dream of Paradise 
— a vision of enchantment — a city of illusion. 



XXII 



EPHESUSI THE CITY THAT WAS 



IKE Oriental harbors generally, Smyrna from the 



L / sea has a magic charm. When we slowly sailed 
down a long reach of water between quiet hills and 
saw the ancient city rising from the morning mist, 
we had somehow a feeling that we had reached a 
hitherto undiscovered port — a mirage, perhaps, of 
some necromancer's spell. 

We landed, found our train, and went joggling 
away through the spring landscape, following the 
old highway that from time immemorial has led from 
Ephesus to Smyrna — the highway which long ago 
St. Paul travelled, and St. John, too, no doubt, and 
the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalen. For all these 
journeyed between Ephesus and Smyrna in their 
time, and the ancient road would be crowded with 
countless camel trains and laden donkeys then; also 
with the wheeled vehicles of that period — cars and 
chariots and cages of wild animals for the games — 
and there would be elephants, too, gaudily caparisoned, 
carrying some rich potentate of the East and his 
retinue — a governor, perhaps, or a king. It was a 
mighty thoroughfare in those older days and may be 
still, though it is no longer crowded, and we did not 
notice any kings. 

We did notice some Reprobates — the ones we have 




The Ship -Dwellers 



always with us. They sat just across the aisle, 
engaged in their usual edifying discussion as to the 
identity of the historic sites we were supposed to 
be passing. Finally they got into a particularly 
illuminating dispute as to the period of St. Paul's 
life and ministrations. It began by the Apostle (our 
Apostle) casually remarking that St. Paul had lived 
about twenty-one hundred years ago. 

It was a mild remark — innocent enough in its 
trifling inaccuracy of two or three centuries — but it 
disturbed the Colonel, who has fallen into the guide- 
book habit, and is set up with the knowledge 
thereof. 

''Look here," he said, "if I knew as little as you do 
about such things I'd restrain the desire to give out 
information before company." 

The Apostle was undisturbed by this sarcasm. He 
folded his hands across his comfortable forward ele- 
vation and smiled in his angel way. 

"Oh, you think so," he said placidly. "Well, you 
think like a camel's hump. You never heard of St. 
Paul till you started on this trip. I used to study 
about him at Sunday-school when a mere child." 

4 ' Yes, you did ! as a child ! Why, you old lobscouse ' ' 
(lobscouse is an article on the Kurfiirst bill of fare) 
''you never saw the inside of a Sunday-school. You 
heard somebody last night say something about 
twenty-one hundred years ago, and with your genius 
for getting facts mixed you saddled that date on St. 
Paul." 

The Colonel turned for corroboration to the Horse- 
Doctor, who regarded critically the outlines of the 

192 



Ephesus : the City that Was 



Apostle, which for convenience required an entire 
seat; then, speaking thoughtfully: 

"It isn't worth while to notice the remarks of a 
person who looks like that. Why, he's all malformed. 
He'll probably explode before we reach Ephesus." 

I felt sorry for the Apostle, and was going over to 
sit with him, only there wasn't room, and just then 
somebody noticed a camel train — the first we have 
seen — huge creatures heavily loaded and plodding 
along on the old highway. This made a diversion. 
Then there was another camel train, and another. 
Then came a string of donkeys — all laden with the 
wares of the East going to Smyrna. The lagging 
Oriental day was awake; the old road was still alive, 
after all. 

Like the first "Innocents," we had brought a car- 
load or so of donkeys — four-legged donkeys — from 
Smyrna, and I think they were the same ones, from 
their looks. They were aged and patchy, and they 
filled the bill in other ways. They wrung our hearts 
with their sad, patient faces and their decrepitude, 
and they exasperated us with their indifference to 
our desires. 

I suppose excursion parties look pretty much alike, 
and that the Quaker City pilgrims forty-two years ago 
looked a good deal like ours as we strung away down 
the valley toward the ancient city. I hope they did 
not look any worse than ours. To see long-legged 
men and stout ladies perched on the backs of those 
tiny asses, in rickety saddles that feel as if they would 
slip (and do slip if one is not careful) , may be diverting 
enough, but it is not pretty. If the donkey stays in 

i93 



The Ship -Dwellers 



the middle of the narrow, worn pathway, it is very 
well ; but if he goes to experimenting and wandering 
off over the rocks, then look out. You can't steer 
him with the single remnant of rope on his halter (he 
has no bridle), and he pitches a good deal when he 
gets off his course. Being a tall person, I was closed 
up like a grasshopper, and felt fearfully top-heavy. 
Laura, age fourteen, kept behind me — commenting 
on my appearance and praying for my overthrow. 

It was a good way to the ruins — the main ruins — 
though in reality there were ruins everywhere: old 
mosques, gray with age and half -buried in the soil — 
a thousand years old, but young compared with the 
more ancient city ; crumbling Roman aqueducts lead- 
ing away to the mountains — old even before the 
mosques were built, but still new when Ephesus was 
already hoary with antiquity ; broken columns stick- 
ing everywhere out of the weeds and grass — scarred, 
crumbling, and moss-grown, though still not of that 
first, far, unrecorded period. 

But by-and-by we came to mighty walls of stone — 
huge abutments rising from the marshy plain — and 
these were really old. The Phoenicians may have 
laid them in some far-off time, but tradition goes still 
farther back and declares they were laid by giants — 
the one-eyed kind, the Cyclops — when all this marsh 
was sea. These huge abutments were piers in that 
ancient day. A blue harbor washed them, and the 
merchant ships of mighty Ephesus lay alongside and 
loaded for every port. 

That was a long time ago. Nobody can say when 
these stone piers were built, but Diana and Apollo 

194 



Ephesus : the City that Was 



were both born in Ephesus, and there was probably a 
city here even then. What we know is that by the be- 
ginning of the Christian era Ephesus was a metropo- 
lis with a temple so amazing, a theatre so vast and 
a library so beautiful that we stand amid the desola- 
tion to-day, helplessly trying to reconstruct the pro- 
portions of a community which could require these 
things; could build them and then vanish utterly, 
leaving not a living trace behind. 

For nobody to-day lives in Ephesus — not a soul. 
A wandering shepherd may build his camp-fire here, 
or an Arab who is tilling a bit of ground; but his 
home will be in Ayasaluk, several miles away, not 
here. Once the greatest port of trade in western 
Asia, Ephesus is voiceless and vacant now, except 
when a party like ours comes to disturb its solitude 
and trample among its forlorn glories. 

There is no lack of knowledge concerning certain 
of the structures here — the more recent ones, we may 
call them, though they were built two thousand years 
ago. There are descriptions everywhere, and some 
of them are as cleanly cut to-day as they were when 
the tool left them. This library was built in honor 
of Augustus Caesar and Livia, and it must have been 
a veritable marble vision. Here in its corners the 
old students sat and pored over books and precious 
documents that filled these crumbling recesses and 
the long- vanished shelves. St. Paul doubtless came 
here to study during the three years of his residence, 
and before him St. John, for he wrote his gospel in 
Ephesus, and would be likely to seek out the place of 
books. And Mary would walk with him to the door 

i95 



The Ship -Dwellers 



sometimes, I think, and Mary of Magdala, for these 
three passed their final days in Ephesus, and would 
be drawn close together by their sacred bond. 

The great theatre where St. Paul battled with the 
wild beasts stands just across the way. It seated 
twenty-five thousand, and its stone benches stretch 
upward to the sky. The steep marble flight that 
carries you from tier to tier is there to-day exactly 
as when troops of fair ladies and handsome beaux 
climbed up and still up to find their places from which 
to look down on the play or the gladiatorial combat 
or the massacre of the Christians in the arena below. 

These old theatres were built in a semicircle dug 
out of the mountain-side, so that the seats were solid 
against the ground and rose one above the other with 
the slope of the hill, which gave everybody a good 
view. There were no columns to interfere with one's 
vision, for there was no roof to be supported, except, 
perhaps, over the stage, but the top seats were so 
remote from the arena and the proscenium that the 
players must have seemed miniatures. Yet even above 
these there was still mountain-side, and little boys 
who could not get money for an entrance fee or carry 
water to the animals for a ticket sat up in that far 
perch, no doubt, and looked down and shouted at the 
show. 

Laura and I, who, as usual, had dropped behind 
the party, climbed far up among the seats and tried to 
imagine we had come to the afternoon performance — 
had come early, not to miss any of it. But it was 
difficult, even when we shut our eyes. Weeds and 
grass grew everywhere in the crevices; dandelions 

196 



Ephesus : the City that Was 



bloomed and briers tangled where sat the beaux and 
belles of twenty centuries ago. Just here at our feet 
the mobs of Demetrius the silversmith gathered, cry- 
ing, " Great is Diana of the Ephesians!" because the 
religion of St. Paul was spoiling their trade for minia- 
ture temples. Down there in the arena Paul did 
battle with the beasts, very likely as punishment. 
This is the spot — these are the very benches — but 
we cannot see the picture : we cannot wake the tread 
of the vanished years. 

Behind the arena are the columns that support the 
stage, and back of these are the dressing-rooms, their 
marble walls as solid and perfect to-day as when the 
ancient players dallied and gossiped there. At one 
end is a dark, cave-like place where we thought the 
wild beasts might have been kept. I stood at the 
entrance and Laura made my picture, but she com- 
plained that I did not look fierce enough for her pur- 
pose. 

On another slope of the hill a smaller theatre, the 
Odeon, has recently been uncovered. A gem of 
beauty it was, and much of its wonder is still pre- 
served. Here the singers of a forgotten time gave 
forth their melody to a group of music-lovers, gathered 
in this close circle of seats that not a note or shading 
might be lost. 

We passed around this dainty playhouse, across a 
little wheat-field that some peasant has planted 
against its very walls, on up the hill, scrambling 
along steep declivities over its brow, and, behold! 
we came out high above the great theatre on the other 
side, and all the plain and slopes of the old city, with 

197 



The Ship -Dwellers 



its white fragments and its poor ruined harbor, lay at 
our feet. Earthquakes shook the city down and filled 
up the splendid harbor. If the harbor had been spared 
the city would have been rebuilt. Instead, the harbor 
is a marsh, the city a memory. 

From where we stood we could survey the sweep of 
the vanished city. We could look across into the 
library and the market-place and follow a marble road 
— its white blocks worn smooth by a million treading 
feet — where it stretched away toward the sea. And 
once more we tried to conjure the vision of the past — 
to close our eyes and reproduce the vanished day. 
And once more we failed. We could glimpse a picture, 
we could construct a city, but it was never quite 
that city — never quite in that place. Our harbor with 
its white sails and thronging wharves was never quite 
that harbor — our crowded streets were never quite 
those streets. Here were just ruins — always ruins — 
they could never have been anything but ruins. 
Perhaps our imaginations were not in good working 
order. 

We descended again into the great theatre, for it 
fascinated us, nearly breaking our necks where vines 
and briers tangled, pausing every other minute to 
rest and consider and dream. Pawing over a heap 
of rubbish — odd bits of carving, inscriptions, and the 
like — the place is a treasure-trove of such things — I 
found a little marble torso of a female figure. Head 
and arms and the lower part of the body all gone, 
but what remained was exquisite beyond words — a 
gem, even though rubbish, in Ephesus. 

Now, of course, the reader is an honest person. He 

198 



£2 
?8 



3"S. 



P CD 



S3 



(U O 



w 

f 
> 

5 

2 > 

*° 

o r 
*> o 

C cn 

3 O 


H 

> w 

w o 
o r 



H 3 
° 3 

50 _ 




Ephesus : the City that Was 



would have said, as I did: ''No, it does not matter, 
rubbish or no rubbish, it is not mine. It belongs to 
the government — I cannot steal. Besides, there is 
Laura, age fourteen: I cannot set her a bad example. 
Also, there are the police. No, my conscience is per- 
fect; I cannot do it." 

I know the reader would have reflected thus, and so 
did I, as stated. Then I found I could crowd it into 
my inside coat-pocket, and that by cramming my 
handkerchief carefully on top of it, it did not distress 
me so much, especially when I gave it a little support 
with my forearm, to make it swing in a natural way. 
But when I remembered that the Quaker City pil- 
grims had been searched on leaving Ephesus, my con- 
science began to harass me again, though not enough 
as yet to make me disgorge. 

Our party had all trailed back to the hotel when we 
got to our donkeys, and it was beginning to sprinkle 
rain. The sky was overcast and a quiet had settled 
among the ruins. When our donkey-driver gave me a 
sharp look I began to suffer. I thought he was a spy, 
and had his eye on that pocket. I recalled now that 
I had always had a tender conscience; it seemed 
unwise to torture it in this way. 

I began to think of ways to ease it. I thought 
five francs might do it, so far as our donkey-boy was 
concerned. But then there was the official search 
at the other end; that, of course, would be a public 
matter, and the five francs would be wasted. I was 
almost persuaded to drop the little torso quietly by 
the roadside — it discomforted me so. 

We rode along rather quietly, and I spoke improv- 

199 



The Ship -Dwellers 



ingly to Laura of how St. Paul had travelled over this 
very road when he was making his good fight, and of 
several other saints and their works, and how Ephesus 
had probably been destroyed because of its sinfulness. 
Near a crumbling arch a flock of sheep grazed, herded 
by a shepherd who had been there when the apostles 
came — at least his cape had, and his hat — and every- 
thing about him was Biblical and holylike, and so 
were the gentle rain and the donkeys, and I said how 
sweet and soothing it all was; after which I began 
to reflect on what would be proper to do if anything 
resembling an emergency should conclude our peaceful 
ride. I decided that, as we had just come from 
Smyrna, I had bought the bit of heathen marble on 
the way to the station. That was simple and straight- 
forward, and I felt a good deal strengthened as I 
practised it over and tried it on Laura as we rode 
along. The Kurfiirsters had been with me and would 
stand by the statement — any Kurftirster would do 
that whether he flocked with the forward-cabin crowd 
or the unregenerates of the booze-bazaar. I felt reas- 
sured and whistled a little, and then from the road- 
side a man rose up and said something sharp to our 
donkey-driver. It was sudden, and I suppose I did 
jump a little, but I was ready for him. 

"No," I said, "I didn't steal it. I bought it in 
Smyrna on the way to the train. I can prove it by 
Laura here, and the other passengers. We are in- 
corruptible. Go in peace." 

But it was wasted. This creature had business only 
with our donkey -driver and his tobacco. He didn't 
understand a word I said. 

200 



Ephesus : the City that Was 



We rode amid a very garden of fragmentary ruins. 
Precious blocks of fluted marble, rich with carving 
and inscriptions, lay everywhere. We were confront- 
ed by gems of sculpture and graven history at every 
turn. Yet here I was, suffering over a little scrap 
the size of one's fist. No conscience should be as 
sensitive 'as that. 

Suddenly a regular bundle of firearms — a human 
arsenal — stepped out of a shed into the middle of the 
road and began a harangue. I could feel my hair 
turning gray. 

44 You are wholly in error," I said. "I bought it in 
Smyrna. All the passengers saw me. Still, I will 
give it up if you say so." 

But that was wasted, too. He only took the rest 
of our driver's tobacco and let us pass. We met a 
little puny calf next, standing shrunken and forlorn 
in the drizzle, but not too shrunken and friendless to 
have a string of blue beads around his neck to avert 
the evil eye. I was inclined to take them away from 
him and put them on myself. 

We were opposite the Temple of Diana by this time 
— all that is left of what was once one of the seven 
wonders of the world. It is only some broken stones 
sinking into a marsh now, but it was a marvel in its 
time, and I remembered how one Herostratus, ages 
ago, had fired it to perpetuate his name — also how the 
Ephesians had snuffed out Herostratus, and issued a 
decree that his name should never again be mentioned 
on pain of severe punishment; which was a mistake, of 
course, for it advertised Herostratus into the coveted 
immortality. I wonder what kind of a mistake the 

201 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Ephesians would make when they found that bit of 
marble on my person, and what kind of advertising I 
would get. 

We were almost to the little hotel now, and, lo! 
right at the gates we were confronted by a file of men 
with muskets. Here it was, then, at last. My moral 
joints turned to water. 

"I didn't do it, gentlemen," I said. "I am without 
a flaw. It was Laura — you can see for yourself she 
looks guilty." 

But they did not search Laura. They did not even 
search me. They merely looked us over and talked 
about us in strange tongues. We reached the shelter 
of the hotel and the comfort of food in safety. Neither 
did they inspect us at the station, and as we glided 
back to Smyrna I impressed upon Laura the value 
of keeping one's conscience clear, and how one is 
always rewarded with torsos and things for pursuing 
a straightforward, simple course through life. 

I suppose a man could take away marble from 
Ephesus to-day by the wagon-load if he had any place 
to take it to. Nobody is excavating there — nobody 
seems to care for it, and never was such a mine of 
relics under the sun. At Ayasaluk, the Arab village, 
priceless treasures of carving and inscription look out 
at you from the wall of every peasant's hut and stable 
— from the tumbling stone fences that divide their 
fields. Wonderful columns stick out of every bank 
and heap of earth. Precious marbles and porphyry 
mingle with the very macadam of the roads. Rare 
pieces are sold around the hotel for a few piastres. 

Remember, a mighty marble city perished here. 



Epbesus : the City that Was 



Earthquakes shook it down, shattered the walls of 
its temples, overthrew the statuary, tumbled the 
inscriptions in the dust. The ages have spread a 
layer of earth upon the ruin, but only partially covered 
it. Just beneath the shallow plough of the peasant 
lie riches uncountable for the nation that shall bring 
them to the light of day. Historical societies dig 
a little here and there, and have done noble work. 
But their means run low before they can make any 
real beginning on the mighty task. Ephesus is still 
a buried city. 

The day will come when Ephesus will be restored 
to her former greatness. It will take an earthquake 
to do it, but the spirit of prophecy is upon me and I 
foresee that earthquake. The future is very long — 
I am in no hurry — fulfilment may take its time. I 
merely want to get my prophecy in now and registered, 
so when the event comes along I shall get proper credit. 
Some day an earthquake will strike Ephesus again; 
the bottom will drop out of that swamp and make it 
a harbor once more; ships will sail in as in the old 
days, and Ephesus, like Athens, will renew her glory. 

Back to Smyrna — a modern city and beautiful from 
any high vantage, with its red-tiled roofs, its domes 
and minarets, its graceful cypress-trees, its picture 
hillsides, and its cobalt sky. It is clean, too, compared 
with Constantinople. To be sure, Smyrna has its 
ruins and its historic interest, with the tomb of Poly- 
carp the martyr, whc was Bishop of Smyrna in the 
second century, and died for his faith at the age of 
eighty-six. He was burned on a hill just outside the 

203 



The Ship-Dwellers 



city on the Ephesus road, and his tomb, guarded by 
two noble cypresses, overlooks the sea. 

But it is busy, bustling Smyrna that, after Ephesus, 
most attracted us. It is more truly the Orient than 
anything we have seen. Fully as picturesque as 
Constantinople in costume, it is brighter, fresher, 
healthier-looking, and, more than all, its crowded 
streets are perpetually full of mighty camel trains 
swinging in from the deeper East, loaded with all the 
wares and fabrics of our dreams. Those camels are 
monstrously large — twice the size of any circus camels 
that come to America, and with their great panniers 
they fill an Oriental street from side to side. 

They move, too, and other things had better keep 
out of the way when a camel train heaves in sight if 
they want to remain undamaged. I was examining some 
things outside of a bazaar when suddenly I thought 
I had been hit by a planet. I thought so because of 
the positive manner of my disaster and the number 
of constellations I saw. But it was only one side of 
a loaded camel that had annihilated me, and the camel 
was moving straight ahead without the slightest 
notion that anything had interfered with its progress. 

It hadn't, as a matter of fact. Nothing short of 
a stone wall interrupts a camel — a Smyrna camel — 
when he's out for business and under a full head of 
steam. Vehicles and other things turn down another 
street when there is a camel train coming. You may 
squat down, as these Orientals do, and get below the 
danger line, for a camel is not likely to step on you, 
but his load is another matter — you must look out for 
that yourself. 

204 



Ephesus : the City that Was 



I was fascinated by the camel trains; they are a 
part of the East I hardly expected to find. I thought 
their day was about over. Nothing of the sort. The 
camel trains, in fact, own Smyrna, and give it its 
commercial importance. They bring the great bulk 
of merchandise — rugs, mattings, nuts, dried fruits, 
spices, and all the rare native handiwork from far dim 
interiors that railroads will not reach in a hundred 
years. They come swinging out of Kurdistan — from 
Ispahan and from Khiva; they cross the burning 
desert of Kara Koom. 

A camel train can run cheaper than the railway 
kind. A railway requires coal and wood for fuel. A 
camel would like those things also. But he is not 
particular — he will accept whatever comes along. He 
will eat anything a goat can, and he would eat the 
goat, too, if permitted — horns and all. Consequently, 
he arrives at Smyrna fit and well fed, ready for the 
thousand miles or so of return trip at a moment's 
notice. 

They run these camel trains in sections — about six 
camels in each. An Arab mounted on a donkey that 
wears a string of blue beads for luck leads each section, 
and the forward camel wears against his shoulder 
a bell. It is a musical compound affair — one bell 
inside the other with a blue bead in the last one to 
keep off the evil eye. I had already acquired some of 
the blue strings of donkey beads, and I made up my 
mind now to have a camel bell. 

By-and-by, at the entrance of a bazaar, I saw one. 
It was an old one — worn with years of chafing against 
the shoulder muscle of many a camel that had followed 
14 205 



The Ship -Dwellers 



the long track from the heart of Asia over swamp and 
steep and across burning sands. At the base of the 
outer bell was a band of Arabic characters — prayers, 
no doubt, from the Koran, for the safety of the cara- 
van. I would never leave Smyrna without that bell. 

However, one must be cautious. I gave it an in- 
different jingle as I passed in and began to examine 
other things. A murmuring, insinuating Moslem was 
at my elbow pushing forward the gaudy bits of 
embroidery and cheaply chased weapons in which I 
pretended an interest. I dallied and priced, and he 
grew weary and discouraged . Finally , hesitating at the 
doorway, I touched the bell again, scarcely noticing it. 

"How much?" 

"Sixtin franc — very chip." 

My impulse was to fling the money at him and grab 
the treasure before he changed his mind. But we do 
not do these things — not any more — we have acquired 
education. Besides, we have grown professionally 
proud of our bargains. 

"Ho! Sixteen francs! You mean six francs — I 
give you five." 

"No — no — sixtin franc — sixtin! What you think? 
Here — fine!" He had the precious thing down and 
was jingling it. Its music fairly enthralled me. But 
I refused to take it in my hands — if I did I should sur- 
render. "See," he continued, pointing to the in- 
scription. "Oh, be-eautiful. Here, fiftin franc — 
three dollar!" 

He pushed it toward me. I pretended to be inter- 
ested in a wretchedly new and cheaply woven rug. I 
had to, to keep steadfast. I waved him off. 

206 



Ep he sits: the City that Was 



"No — no; five francs — no more!" 
He hung up the bell and I started to go. He seized 
it and ran after me. 

"Here, mister — fourtin franc — give me!" 
"Five francs! — no more." 

"No, no, mister — twelve franc — las' price — ver' las' 
price. Here, see!" 

He jingled the bell a little. If he did that once 
more I was gone at any price. 

"Five francs" I said, with heavy decision. "I'll 
give you five francs for it — no more." 

I faced resolutely around — as resolutely as I could — 
and pretended really to start. 

"Here, mister — ten franc — ten! Mister — mister!" 

He followed me, but fortunately he had hung up the 
bell and couldn't jingle it. I was at least two steps 
away. 

"Eight franc, mister — please — I lose money — I 
make nothing — mister — seven! seven franc!" 

"Five — five francs." I called it back over my 
shoulder — indifferently. 

"Mister! mister! Six! six franc!" 

Confound him ! He got hold of that bell again and 
gave it a jingle. I handed him the six francs. If he 
had only left it alone, I think I could have held out. 

Still, as I look at it now, hanging here in my state- 
room, and think of the long lonely nights and the 
days of sun and storm it has seen, of the far journeys 
it has travelled in its weary way down the years to 
me, I do not so much mind that final franc after all. 



XXIII 



INTO SYRIA 

I PICKED up a cold that rainy day at Ephesus. 
Not an ordinary sniffling cold, but a wrenching, 
racking cold that made every bone and every tooth 
jump, and set my eyes to throbbing like the ship's 
engines. I felt sure I was going to die when we arrived 
in the harbor of Beirut, and decided that it would be 
better to die on deck; so I crawled out and dressed, 
and crept into a steamer-chair, and tried to appreciate 
the beautiful city that had arisen out of the sea — the 
upper gateway to Syria. 

The Patriarch came along, highly elate. This was 
where he belonged ; this was home ; this was Phoenicia 
itself! Fifteen hundred years B.C. Beirut had been a 
great Phoenician seaport, he said, and most of the 
rare handiwork mentioned in ancient history and 
mythology had been wrought in this neighborhood. 
The silver vase of Achilles, the garment which Hecuba 
gave to Minerva, and the gold-edged bowl of Telema- 
chus were all Phoenician, according to the Patriarch, 
who hinted that he rather hoped to find some such 
things at Beirut ; also some of the celebrated Phoinus, 
or purple dye, which gave the tribe its name. I said 
no doubt he would, and, being sick and suffering, 
added that he might dye himself dead for all I 
cared, which was a poor joke — besides being an 

208 



Into Syria 



afterthought, when the Patriarch was well out of 
range. 

I had no idea of going ashore. I was miserably 
sorry, too, for I was stuffed with guide-book know- 
ledge about Baalbec and Damascus, and had looked 
forward to that side-trip from the beginning. I knew 
how Moses felt on Mount Pisgah now, and I was 
getting so sorry for myself I could hardly stand it, 
when suddenly the bugle blew the sharp call, "All 
ashore!" Laura, age fourteen, came racing down 
the deck, and before I knew it I had my bag — packed 
the night before — and was going down the ship's 
ladder into a boat, quarrelling meantime with one of 
the Reprobates as to whether Beirut was the Berothai 
of the Old Testament, where David smote Hadadezer 
and took "exceeding much brass," or the Berytus 
of the Roman conquest. It was of no consequence, 
but it gave life a new purpose, for I wanted to prove 
that he was wrong. Wherefore I forgot I was going 
to die, and presently we were ashore and in a railway- 
station where there was a contiguous little train ready 
to start for Baalbec and Damascus, with a lot of men 
selling oranges, of which Laura and I bought a basket- 
ful for a franc, climbed aboard, the bell rang — and 
the funeral was postponed. 

The road followed the sea for a distance, and led 
through fields of flowers. I had never seen wild- 
flowers like those. They were the crimson anemone 
mingled riotously with a gorgeous yellow flower — I 
did not learn its name. The ground was literally 
massed with them. Never was such a prodigality 
of bloom. 

209 



The Ship -Dwellers 



From Beirut to Baalbec is only about sixty miles; 
but it takes pretty much all day to get there, for the 
Lebanon Mountains lie between, and this is a delib- 
erate land. We did not mind. There was plenty to 
see all along, and our leisurely train gave us ample 
time. 

There were the little stations, where we stopped 
anywhere from five to fifteen minutes, and got out 
and mingled with the curious rural life; there were 
the hills, that had little soil on them, but were terraced 
and fruitful — some of them to the very summit; 
there was the old Damascus road, winding with us, 
or above us, or below us — the road over which Abra- 
ham may have travelled, and Adam, too, for that 
matter, and Eve, when they were sent out of their 
happy garden. Eden lay not far from here, and the 
exiles would be likely to come this way, I think. We 
saw plenty of groups that might have been Abraham 
and his household, or any of the patriarchs. I did 
not notice any that suggested Adam and Eve. 

The road had another interest for me. Forty-two 
years ago, before the railroad came this way, the 
Quaker City pilgrims toiled up through the summer 
heat, setting out on the ''long trip" through the full 
length of Palestine. Nobody makes it in summer 
now. Few make it at all, except by rail and in car- 
riages, with good hostelries at the end of every stage. 
Still, I am glad those first pilgrims made it, or we 
should not have had that wonderful picture of Syrian 
summer-time, nor of "Jericho" and " Baalbec." 
Those two horses are worth knowing — in literature — 
and I tried to imagine that little early party of ex- 

2IO 



Into Syria 



cursionists climbing the steep path to Palestine on 
their sorry nags. 

It is warm in Syria, even now, but we were not too 
warm, riding; besides, we were going steadily uphill, 
and by-and-by somebody pointed out a white streak 
along the mountain-top, and it was snow. Then, after 
a long time, we got to a place where the vegetation 
was very scanty and there were no more terraced hills, 
but only barren peaks and sand, where the wind blew 
cold and colder, and presently the snow lay right 
along our way. We had reached the highest point 
then — five thousand feet above the sea. In five hours 
we had come thirty-six miles — thirty-five in length 
and one straight up in the air. Somebody said: 

"Look, there is Mount Hermon!" 

And, sure enough, away to the south, though nigh 
upon us it seemed — so close that one might put out 
his hand and touch it, almost — there rose a stately, 
snow-clad elevation which, once seen, dominated the 
barren landscape. It was so pure white against the 
blue — so impressive in its massive dignity — the eye 
followed it across every vista, longed for it when 
immediate peaks rose between, welcomed it when time 
after time it rose grandly into view. 

With an altitude of between nine and ten thousand 
feet, Mount Hermon is the highest mountain in Syria, 
I believe — certainly the most important. The Bible 
is full of it. The Amorites and the Hivites, and most 
of the other tribes that Joshua buried or persuaded 
to go away, had their lands under Mount Hermon 
(all of them in sight of it), and that grand old hill 
looked down on Joshua's slaughter of men and women 



The Ship -Dwellers 



and little children, and perhaps thought it a puny 
performance to be undertaken in the name, and by 
the direction, of God. 

Joshua established Mount Hermon as the northern 
boundary of Palestine, and from whatever point the 
Israelite turned his face northward, he saw its white 
summit against the blue. It became symbolic of 
grandeur, stability, purity, and peace. It was to 
one of its three peaks that Christ came when, with 
Peter, James, and John, He withdrew to 4 'an high 
mountain apart" for the Transfiguration. So it 
became sanctified as a sort of holy judgment- seat. 1 

Down the Lebanon slope and across the valley to 
Reyak, a Syrian village in the sand, at the foot of the 
Anti-Lebanon range. Reyak is the parting of the 
ways — the railways — that lead to Damascus and 
Baalbec, and there is a lunch-room there — a good one 
by Turkish standards. It was our first complete intro- 
duction to Turkish food — that is a diet of nuts, dates, 
oranges, and curious meat and vegetable preparations 
— and I ate a good deal for a dying man. Then I 
went outside to look at the population, and wonder 
what these people, who scratch a living out of the 
sand and stone barrens, would do in a fertile country 
like America. They would consider it heaven, I thought. 

At the end of the station sat a drowsy, stoutish 
man in semi-European dress, holding a few pairs of 
coarse home-knit socks, evidently for sale. I stopped 
and talked to him. He spoke English very well, 
and when he told me his story I marvelled. 

1 One tradition places the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, but 
Tabor is fifty miles away whereas Cesarea Philippi, to which the 
little group descended, lies at the foot of Hermon, 



Into Syria 



He had been in America; in Brooklyn; had car- 
ried on business there — something in Syrian merchan- 
dise — and had done very well. He had married there 
— a Syrian woman; his children were born there — 
Americans. Then one day he had sold out and brought 
them all to this flat-topped mud village in the Syrian 
sand. Why had he done it? Well, he could hardly 
tell ; he had wanted to see Syria again — he could think 
of no other reason. No, his wife did not like it, nor 
the children — not at all. 

He pointed out his mud hut a little way from the 
station, and I could not blame them. He would go 
back some day — yes, certainly. Meantime, his wife 
is earning money for the trip by knitting the coarse 
socks which he sells around the station at Reyak at 
a few piastres a pair. 

Our train was about ready to start for Baalbec, 
and I was lingering over a little collection of relics 
which a blind pedler offered, when I felt a hand on 
my shoulder and heard my name called. I turned 
and was face to face with the artist Jules Gurin, of 
New York. I had known nothing of his presence in 
Syria, he had known nothing of our coming. He was 
going in one direction, I in another. In this remote 
waste our lines had crossed. He was so glad to see 
me — he thought I had a supply of cigars. I never 
saw a man's enthusiasm die so suddenly as his did 
when I told him how I had been sick that morning 
and forgotten them. 

Altogether that was a curious half hour. Reyak 
is the most uninteresting place in Syria, but I shall 
always remember it. 

213 



XXIV 



THE HOUSE THAT CAIN BUILT 

IT was well along in the afternoon when we reached 
Baalbec, and drove through a cloud of dust to a hotel 
which stands in a mud village near the ruins. Long 
before we arrived we could make out massive rem- 
nants of what was once a wonder of the world, and 
remains no less so to-day. We could distinguish 
sections of the vast wall, and, towering high above 
them, the six columns of the Temple of the Sun. 

I knew those six columns. I had carried a picture 
of them in my mind ever since that winter so long 
ago when the old first edition of the New Pilgrim's 
Progress became familiar in our household. I know 
they were seventy-five feet high and eight feet through, 
and had blocks of stone on the top of them as big as 
our old-fashioned parlor at home ; also, that they were 
probably erected by giants. Those items had made 
an impression that had lasted. Now, here they were, 
outlined against the sky, in full view and perfectly 
familiar, but never in the world could they be as 
big as the book said. Why, these were as slender and 
graceful as fairy architecture! I recalled that there 
were some big stones to see, stones laid by Cain and 
his giants when the world was new. Perhaps they 
would not be so very big, after all. I had a feeling 
that we ought to hurry. 

214 



The House that Cain Built 



We did hurry — Laura and I. We did not wait for 
the party, but set out straight for the ruins, through 
narrow streets and byways, with beggars at our 
heels. By-and-by we came to a rushing brook, and 
just beyond it were the temple walls. 

I remembered now. There had been a wonderful 
garden outside the temples in the old days, and this 
stream had made it richly verdant and beautiful. 
There was no garden any more. Only some grass 
and bushes, such as will gather about an oasis. 

They would not let us into the temple enclosure 
until our party came, so we wandered around the outer 
walls and gazed up at cornices and capitals and en- 
tablatures as beautiful, we thought, as any we had 
seen at Athens. Then the party arrived, and there 
was a gatekeeper to let us in. 

It would take a man in perfect health to carry away 
even an approximate impression of Baalbec. Trying 
to remember now, I seem to have spent the afternoon 
in some amazing delirium of tumbling walls and ruined 
colonnades ; of heaped and piled fragments ; of scarred 
and defaced sculpture; of Titanic masonry flung 
about by the fury of angry gods. Athens had been a 
mellowed and hallowed dream of the past; Ephesus 
a vast suggestion of ancient greatness buried and 
overgrown; Baalbec was a wild agony of destruction 
and desecration crying out to the sky. 

It is a colossal object-lesson in what religions can 
do when they try. Nobody really knows who began 
to build temples here, but from the time of Adam 
Baalbec became a place of altars. Before history be- 
gan it was already a splendid Syrian city, associated 

215 



The Ship -Dwellers 



with the names of Cain, Nimrod, and Abraham, and 
it may have been Cain himself who raised the first 
altar here when he made that offering for which the 
Lord "had not respect." More likely, however — and 
this is the Arab belief — it was the city of refuge built 
by Cain, whose fear must have been very large if 
one may judge from the size of the materials used. 

Cain could not fail to build a temple, however. 
He would try to ease the punishment which he de- 
clared was greater than he could bear, and with burnt 
offering and architecture would seek to propitiate an 
angry God. How long the worship inaugurated by 
him lasted we can only surmise — to the flood, maybe — 
but the Phoenicians came next, and set up temples to 
their Gods, whoever they were, and after the Phoeni- 
cians came Solomon, who built a temple to a sort of 
compromise god by the name of Baal — a deity left 
over by the Phoenicians and adapted to Judean needs 
and ceremonies — hence the name, Baalbec. Solomon 
built the temple to Baal to satisfy certain of his 
heathen wives, and he made the place a strong city 
to rival Damascus — the latter having refused to 
acknowledge his reign. 

After Solomon, the Romans. Two hundred years 
or so after Christ — in the twilight of their glory and 
their gods — the Romans under Elagabalus brought 
the glory of Grecian architecture to Baalbec, named 
the place Heliopolis, and set up temples that were — 
and are — the wonder of the world. 

What satisfactory gods they must have been to 
deserve temples such as these — each shrine a marvel 
of size and beauty — more splendid even than those 

216 



The House that Cain Built 



of the Acropolis of Athens in their lavish magnificence ! 
This carved doorway to the Temple of Jupiter; this 
frieze of the Temple of Bacchus; these towering 
six columns of the Temple of the Sun; still holding 
their matchless Corinthian capitals and amazing en- 
tablature to the sky — where else will one find their 
equals, and what must they have been in their prime, 
when these scarred remnants can still overpower the 
world ! 

It was another religion that brought ruin here — 
early Christianity — presently followed by early Mo- 
hammedanism — each burning with vandalic zeal. It 
was the good Emperor Constantine that first upset the 
Roman gods and their temples. Then Theodosius 
came along and pulled down the great structures, and 
out of the pieces built a church that was an architect- 
ural failure. Then all the early Christians in the 
neighborhood took a hand in pulling down and over- 
turning; hacking away at the heathen sculpture and 
tracery — climbing high up the walls to scar and 
disfigure — to obliterate anything resembling a face. 
Then pretty soon the early Mohammedans came along 
and carried on the good work, and now and then an 
earthquake took a hand, until by-and-by the place 
became the ghastly storm of destruction it appears 
to-day. 

I was ill when I saw Baalbec. My flesh was burning 
and my pulse throbbing with fever. Perhaps my 
vision was distorted and the nightmare seemed worse 
than it really is, but as I stood in that field of mutila- 
tion and disorder, gazing along its wrecked and insult- 
ed glory, and through tumbling arch and ruined door 

217 



The Ship-Dwellers 



caught vistas of fertile and snow-capped hill, I seemed 
to see a vision of what it had been in the day of its 
perfection. Also, I felt an itch to meet one or two of 
those early enthusiasts — some night in a back alley 
when they were not looking for me and I had a piece 
of scantling — I felt a sick man's craving, as it were, 
to undertake a little damage and disfiguration on 
my own account. Oh, well, it's all in the eternal 
story. Religions established these temples ; religions 
pulled them down. The followers of one faith have 
always regarded as heathen those which preceded 
them. There lies a long time ahead. Will the next 
religion restore Baalbec or complete its desolation ? 

Some little Syrian girls beset Laura on the way 
back to the hotel and tried to sell her some bead 
embroidery which it seems they make in a mission- 
school established here by the English. One of them 
— a little brown madonna of about ten — could speak 
English quite well. Laura asked her name. 

"Name Mary," she said. 

"But that's an English name." 

She trotted along silently, thinking; then said: 

"No, Syria — Mary Syria name." 

Sure enough, we had forgotten. The first Mary 
had indeed been Syrian, and I imagined her, now, a 
child — brown, barefoot and beautiful, like this Mary, 
with the same pathetic eyes. Laura — young, fair- 
skinned and pink-cheeked — was a marvel to these 
children. They followed her to the door, and when 
she could not buy all their stock in trade they insisted 
on making her presents, and one of them — little 
Mary — begged to be taken to America. 

218 



The House that Cain Built 



We saw the celebrated "big stones" next morning. 
Several of them are built into the lower tiers of the 
enclosing temple wall, and three of these — the largest 
ones — measure each from sixty-two to sixty-four feet 
long and are thirteen feet thick! They rest upon 
stones somewhat thicker, but shorter — stones about 
the size of a two-story cottage — and these in turn rest 
on masonry still less gigantic. Evidently it was the 
intention of the builders to increase the size of their 
material as they went higher, and the big block still 
in the quarry carries out that idea. 

Authorities differ as to when these big stones were 
laid, and how. Some claim that they were put here 
by the Romans, because they find Greek axe-marks 
on the ones below them. But then I found American 
jack-knife marks on them too, and the names of cer- 
tain of my countrymen, which proves nothing except 
that these puny people had been there and left their 
measurement. If these monster stones had been laid 
by the Romans only two thousand years ago, we 
should have had some knowledge of the means by 
which they were transported and lifted into place. 
There is no such record, and nowhere else at least did 
the Romans ever attempt structure of such gigantic 
proportions. That is precisely the word, "gigantic," 
for there were giants in the days when these stones 
were laid — stones that could have been there six 
thousand years as well as two thousand, being of such 
material as forms the foundations of the world. 

If Cain did any building at Baalbec, he did it here. 
He did not finish the work, it would seem, or at least 
not in these proportions. Perhaps his giants deserted 

219 



The Ship -Dwellers 



him — struck, as we say to-day. Perhaps the hands 
of men were no longer against him and the need of this 
mighty bulwark about his place of refuge ceased. At 
all events x the first stone hewn out for the next layer 
stands in the quarry still. 

We drove over there. It was half a mile away, at 
least — possibly a mile, down hill and rather rough 
going. The stones we saw in the wall were brought 
up that road. The one standing in the quarry had 
been lifted and started a little, and would have been 
on its way presently, if the strike, or the amnesty, had 
not interfered. 

It is seventy-two feet long and seventeen feet thick. 
Try to think of a plain box building, a barn or a store- 
house, say, of that size, then mentally convert it into 
a solid block of stone. Mark Twain likens it to two 
freight-cars placed end to end, but it is also as high 
and as wide. Eight freight-cars set four and four 
would just about express it! Think of that! Think 
of moving a stone of that size! 

It is squared and dressed and ready to be taken to 
the temple wall. It will never be taken there. Per- 
haps that last item is gratuitous information, but at 
least it is authentic. We have no means of moving 
that stone half a mile up a rough hill in these puny 
times, and the speculations as to how Cain did it have 
been mainly hazy and random — quite random. 

One writer suggests that such stones were "rolled 
up an inclined plane of earth prepared for the pur- 
pose." I should love to see a stone like that rolled. 
I'd travel all the way to Baalbec again for the sight, 
and they could prepare the inclined plane any way 

220 



The House that Cain Built 



they pleased. An Oriental authority declares that 
these stones were moved and laid by the demon 
Echmoudi, which is better than the rolling idea. I 
confess a weakness for Echmoudi, but I fear hard cold 
science will frown him out of court. 

It has taken an Englishman to lead the way to 
light. He says that Cain employed mastodons to do 
his moving. Now we are on the way to truth, but we 
must go further — a good deal further. Cain did em- 
ploy mastodons, but only for his light work. Even 
mastodons would balk at pulling stones like these. 
Cain would use brontosaurs for such work as that. 
There were plenty of them loafing about, and I can 
imagine nothing more impressive than Cain standing 
on a handy elevation overlooking his force of giants 
and a sixteen-span brontosaur team yanking a stone 
as big as a bonded warehouse up Baalbec hill. 

Truly, there is no reason why those monster stones 
should not have been quarried a million or so years ago 
and moved by the vast animal creatures of that period. 
We have biblical authority for the giants, and I have 
seen a brontosaur in the New York Museum that 
seemed to go with stones of about that size. Think 
of any force the Romans could summon rolling a 
three-million-pound square stone up an inclined 
plane. Preposterous! The brontosaur's the thing. 

15 



XXV 



GOING DOWN TO DAMASCUS 

THERE is a good deal of country, mainly desert, 
between Baalbec and Damascus, and a good 
many barren hills. Crossing the Anti-Lebanon moun- 
tains there is a little of water and soil and much red, 
rocky waste. Here and there a guide pointed out a 
hill where Cain killed Abel — not always the same hill, 
but no matter, it was a hill in this neighborhood ; any 
one of them would make a good place. Occasionally 
the train passed a squalid village, perched on a lonely 
shelf — a single roof stretching over most of the houses 
— the inhabitants scarcely visible. We wondered 
where they got their sustenance. They were shep- 
herds, perhaps, but where did their flocks feed ? 

Across the divide, between snow-capped hills, and 
suddenly we are face to face with green banks and 
the orchard bloom of spring. We have reached 
the Abana, the river which all the ages has flowed 
down to Damascus with its gift of eternal youth. 
For as the desert defends, so the river sustains Da- 
mascus, and the banks of the Abana (they call it the 
Barada now) are just a garden — the Garden of Eden, 
if old tales be true. 

It is not hard to believe that tradition here, at this 
season. Peach, apricot, almond, and plum fairly sing 
with blossom ; birch and sycamore blend a cadence of 

222 



Going Down to Damascus 



tender green; the red earth from which Adam was 
created (and which his name signifies) forms an 
abundant underchord. If we could linger a little by 
these pleasant waters we might learn the lilt of the 
tree of life — its whisper of the forbidden fruit. 

We are among our older traditions here — the begin- 
nings of the race. We have returned after devious 
wanderings. These people whom we see leading 
donkeys and riding camels, tending their flocks and 
bathing in the Abana, they are our relatives — sons and 
daughters of Adam. Only, they did not move away. 
They stayed on the old place, as it were, and preserved 
the family traditions, and customs. I am moved to 
get out and call them " cousin" and embrace them, 
and thank them for not trailing off after the false 
gods and frivolities of the West. 

The road that winds by the Abana is full of pictures. 
The story of the Old Testament — the New, too, for 
that matter — is dramatized here in a manner and a 
setting that would discourage the artificial stage. 
Not a group but might have stepped out of the Bible 
pages. This man leading a little donkey — a woman 
riding it — their garb and circumstance the immutable 
investment of the East : so the patriarchs journeyed ; 
so, two thousand years later, Joseph and Mary 
travelled into Egypt. No change, you see, in all 
that time — no change in the two thousand years that 
have followed — no change in the two thousand years 
that lie ahead. Wonderful, changeless East! How 
frivolous we seem in comparison — always racing after 
some new pattern of head-gear or drapery ! How can 
we hope to establish any individuality, any nationality, 

223 



The Ship -Dwellers 



any artistic stability when we have so little fixed 
foundation in what, more than any other one thing, 
becomes a part of the man himself — his clothing ? 

These hills are interesting. Some of them have 
verdure on them, and I can fancy Abraham pasturing 
his flocks on them, and with little Isaac chasing 
calves through the dews of Hermon. It would not 
be the 4 'dews of Hermon," but I like the sound of 
that phrase. I believe history does not mention that 
Abraham and Isaac chased calves. No matter; 
anybody that keeps flocks has to chase calves now 
and then, and he has to get his little boy to help him. 
So Abraham must sometimes have called Isaac quite 
early in the morning to ' 'go and head off that calf," 
just as my father used to call me, and I can imagine 
how they raced up and down and sweat and panted, 
and how they said uncomplimentary things about 
the calf and his family, and declared that there was 
nothing on earth that could make a person so mad 
as a fool calf, anyhow. 

Travel on the highway has increased — more camels, 
more donkeys, more patriarchs with their families 
and flocks. Merchandise trains follow close, one be- 
hind the other. Dust rises in a fog and settles on the 
wayside vegetation. Here and there on the hillsides 
are villas and entertainment gardens. 

A widening of the valley, an expanse of green and 
bloom, mingled with domes and minarets; a slowing 
down of speed, a shouting of porters through the sunlit 
dust, and behold, we have reached the heart and 
wonder of the East, Damascus, the imperishable — 
older than history, yet forever young. 

224 



XXVI 



THE ''PEARL OF THE EAST " 

IT is the oldest city in the world. It is the oldest 
locality mentioned in the Bible, if the Garden of 
Eden theory be true. I suspect that Noah's flood 
washed away the garden, and that his grandson, Uz, 
wanted to commemorate the site by building a city 
there. At all events, Uz built Damascus, according 
to Josephus, and he could not have picked a better 
location than this wide, level plain, watered by these 
beautiful living streams. That was about 2400 B.C., 
which means that Damascus was already an old city 
— five hundred years old, or more — when Abraham 
overtook Chedorlaomer, King of Elam — Tidal, King 
of Nations, and two other kings — these four having 
captured Abraham's nephew, Lot, "who dwelt in 
Sodom, and his goods, and departed." 

A matter of four kings did not disturb Abraham. 
He had a better combination than that. He armed 
his trained servants, three hundred and eighteen in 
number, "born in his own house," and went after 
those kings and ' ' smote them and pursued them unto 
Hobah, which is on the left hand of Damascus, rescued 
Lot and brought back the goods." 

That is the first Bible mention of Damascus, and 
it was no doubt a goodly city, even then. After that 
it appears, time and again, in both the scriptures, 
and one never fails to feel its importance in the world's 

226 



The ''Pearl of the East" 



story. Five hundred years after Abraham, Thothmes 
III. thought it worth while to cross over from Egypt 
to conquer Damascus, and after still another five 
hundred years King David ravaged the country round 
about and set up a garrison here. Those were not 
frequent changes. Damascus does not do things 
frequently or without reflection. I believe the Medes 
came next, and after them the Romans, and then, 
quite recently — recently for Damascus, I mean — only 
thirteen hundred years ago — the Mohammedans took 
the place and have held it ever since. 

And Damascus herself has remained unchanged. 
Other cities have risen and prospered and perished' 
even from memory. They did not matter to Damas- 
cus. Nothing matters to Damascus. It may have 
altered its appearance a trifle now and then, but not 
materially. It is the same Damascus that Abraham 
knew and that David conquered. I can see both 
of these old fellows any time I look out of my hotel 
window; also, the three hundred and eighteen ser- 
vants born in Abraham's household — all the tableau 
of the ancient city that has remained forever young. 

"Though old as history itself, thou art as fresh as 
the breath of spring, blooming as thine own rosebud, 
and fragrant as thine own orange-flower, O Damascus, 
pearl of the East!" 

We are at the Grande Hotel Victoria. All these 
hotels are "Grande" something or other. A box 
shanty ten by fifteen is likely to be called "Grande 
Hotel de France." However, the Victoria is grand, 
rather, and quite Oriental in its general atmosphere. 

227 



The Ship -Dwellers 



The rooms are clean, too, and the Turkish pictures 
amusing. Furthermore, our rooms look across the 
river — the soul of Damascus — the water in which 
Eve first saw her sweet reflected form, if tradition 
holds. Its banks are bordered by a great thorough- 
fare now, where against a background of peach- 
bloom and minaret an eternal panorama flows by. 
Camel trains from Bagdad and the far depths of 
Persia; mule trains from the Holy Land; donkey 
trains from nowhere in particular ; soldiers with bands 
playing weird music; groups of Arabs mounted on 
splendid horses — dark men with long guns, their 
burnouses flying in the wind. One might sit here for- 
ever and drift out of time, out of space, in the fabric 
of the never-ending story. 

Being late in the afternoon, with no programme, 
Laura and I set out to seek adventure, were imme- 
diately adopted by a guide, and steered toward the 
bazaars. We crossed a public square near the hotel 
where there were all sorts and conditions of jackasses 
— some of them mounted by men, others loaded with 
every merchandise under the sun. We saw our first 
unruly donkey just then — a very small donkey 
mounted by a very fat son of the prophet with a vast 
turban and beard. It being the Mohammedan Sun- 
day (Friday) , he had very likely been to the mosque 
and to market, and was going home. He had a very 
large bush broom under his arm, and it may have 
been this article thrashing up and down on the don- 
key's flank that made him restive. At all events, he 
was cavorting about (the donkey, I mean) in a most 
unseemly fashion for one bestridden, by so grave a 

228 



/ 



The " Pearl of the East" 



burden, and Mustapha Mohammed — they are all 
named that — was bent forward in a ball, uttering 
what Laura thought might be quotations from the 
Koran. We did not see what happened. They were 
still gyrating and spinning when we were caught up 
by the crowd and swept into the bazaar. 

The Grande Bazaar of Damascus excels anything 
we have seen. It is bigger and better and cleaner 
than the bazaar of Constantinople, and a hundred — 
no, a million — times more inviting. No Christian 
could eat anything in a Constantinople market-place. 
The very thought of it gags me now as I write, while 
here in Damascus, Laura and I were having confections 
almost immediately — and lemonade cooled with snow 
brought on the backs of camels from the Lebanon 
mountain-tops. Mark Twain speaks of the place 
as being filthy. I think they must have cleaned up 
a good deal since then; besides, that was midsummer. 
I would not like to say that the place is speckless, 
but for the Orient it was clean, and the general bouquet 
was not disturbing. Also, I had a safer feeling in 
Damascus. I did not feel that if I stepped into a side- 
street I would immediately be dragged down and 
robbed. I did not feel as if I were a lost soul in a 
bedlam of demons. 

We noticed other things. The little booths, one 
after another, were rilled with the most beautiful 
wares — such wares as we have seen nowhere else — 
but the drowsy merchants sat crosslegged in medi- 
tation, smoking their nargileh or reading their prayers, 
and did not ask us to buy. If we stopped to look at 
their goods they hardly noticed us. If we priced them 

229 



The Ship -Dwellers 



they answered our guide in Arabic monosyllables. 
Here and there a Jew with a more pretentious stock 
would solicit custom in the old way of Israel, but the 
Arab was silent, indifferent, disinterested. Clearly it 
was his preference that we pass by as quickly as 
possible. His goods were not for such as us. I did 
manage to add to my collection of donkey-beads, 
and would have bought more if Laura had not sug- 
gested that they probably thought I was buying them 
to wear myself. At the book-booth they even would 
not let us touch the volumes displayed for sale. 

Another thing I have noticed : there are no beggars 
here — none worth while. Now and then, perhaps, 
somebody half extends a timid hand, but on the 
whole there is a marked absence of begging. Damas- 
cus does not beg from the Christian. 

It is a weird, wonderful place, that bazaar. It 
covers an endless space, if one may judge from its 
labyrinthine interior. Everywhere they stretch away, 
the dim arcades, nimsily roofed with glass and matting 
and bark, fading into vague Oriental vistas of flitting 
figures and magic outlines. Here in the main thor- 
oughfare a marvellous life goes on. The space is 
wide, and there are masses of people moving to and 
fro, mingled with donkeys and camels, and even car- 
riages that dash recklessly through; and there is a 
constant cry of this thing and that thing from the 
donkey-boys and the pedlers of nuts and bread and 
insipid sweetened drinks. Some of the pedling 
people clatter little brass cymbals as they walk up and 
down, and repeat over and over some words which 
our guide said were something between a prayer and 

230 



The "Pearl of the East" 



a song, probably as old as the language. 1 And the 
vendors of drinks carry their stock in trade in a goat- 
skin, or maybe in a pigskin, which is not a pretty 
thing to look at — all black and hairy and wet, with 
distended legs sticking out like something drowned. 
We didn't buy any of those drinks. We thought 
they might be clean enough, but we were no longer 
thirsty. 

All sorts of things are incorporated in this bazaar: 
old dwelling-houses; columns of old temples; stair- 
ways beginning anywhere, leading nowhere; mosques 
— the limitless roof of merchandise has stretched 
out and enveloped these things. To attempt a de- 
tailed description of the place would be unwisdom. 
One may only generalize this vast hive of tiny trades- 
men and tiny trades. All the curious merchants and 
wares we have seen pictured for a lifetime are gathered 
here. It is indeed the Grande Bazaar — the emporium 
of the East. 

The street we followed came to an end by-and-by 
at a great court open to the sky. It was a magnificent 
enclosure, and I was quite willing to enter it. I did 
not do so, however. I had my foot raised to step 
over the low barrier, when there was a warning cry 
and a brown hand pushed me back. Our guide had 
dropped a step behind. He came hurrying up now, 
and explained that this was the court of the Great 
Mosque. We must have special permission to enter. 
We would come with the party to-morrow. 

The place impressed me more than any mosque 

^he pedler of bread cries, "O Allah who sustaineth us, send 
trade ! " The pedler of beverages, " O cheer thine heart ! " 

231 



The Ship -Dwellers 



we have seen — not for its beauty, though it is beauti- 
ful, but because of its vastness, its open sky, and its 
stone floor, polished like glass by the bare and stock- 
inged feet that have slipped over it for centuries. 
We could not enter, but we were allowed to watch 
those who came as they removed their shoes and step- 
ped over into the court to pray. When you realize 
that the enclosure is as big as two or three city squares, 
and that the stones, only fairly smooth in the begin- 
ning, reflect like a mirror now, you will form some 
idea of the feet and knees and hands that have 
pressed them, and realize something of the fervor of 
the Damascus faith. 

We left the bazaar by a different way, and our 
guide got lost getting us back to the hotel. I didn't 
blame him, though — anybody could get lost in those 
tangled streets. We were in a hopeless muddle, 
for it was getting dark, when down at the far end of 
a narrow defile Laura got a glimpse of a building 
which she said was like one opposite our hotel. So 
we went to look for it, and it was the same building. 
Then our guide found the hotel for us, and we paid 
him, and everything was all right. He didn't know 
anything about the city, I believe, but was other- 
wise a perfect guide. 

Following, we put in a busy two days in Damas- 
cus — a marvellous two days, I thought. Our car- 
riages were at the hotel next morning, and I want 
to say here that of all the carriages and horses 
we have seen, those of Damascus are far and away 
the best. The horses are simply beautiful creatures 
and in perfect condition. Even those kept for hire 

232 



The "Pearl of the East" 



are superb animals with skins of velvet. They are 
Arabian, of course, and I can believe, now, that the 
Arab loves his horse, for I have never seen finer 
animals, not even on Fifth Avenue. I can under- 
stand, too, why the Quaker City pilgrims — ambling 
into Damascus on those old, blind, halt and spavined 
Beirut nags — made their entry by night. 

And these Damascus horses go. Their drivers 
may love them, but they make them hurry. They 
crack their whips, and we go racing through the streets 
like mad. However deliberate the East may be in 
most things, it is swift enough in the matter of driving. 

I don't care for it. It keeps me watching all the 
time to see what kind of an Arab we are going to 
kill, and I miss a good many sights. We went 
through that crowded thoroughfare of the Grande 
Bazaar at a rate which fairly was homicidal. Cer- 
tainly if those drowsy shopkeepers did not hate 
Christians enough before, they do now. 

We drove to the Grande Mosque, and we had to put 
on slippers, of course, to enter even the outer court. 
It is nearly a quarter of a mile long, and we slid 
and straddled across that vast marble skating-rink, 
pausing at a little pavilion — the Dome of the Treasury 
— where they keep some venerable books — the oldest 
books in the world, I believe, and so sacred that 
nobody ever sees them. Then we entered the Grande 
Mosque itself — still known as the Church of St. John 
the Divine. 

For, like the temples of Baalbec and otherwheres, 
the Grande Mosque of Damascus has sheltered a 
variety of religious doctrines. It was the Temple 

233 



The Ship -Dwellers 



of Rimmon, first, god of the Syrians. The Romans, 
who conquered and templed the world, came next, 
and built here, as they always built, in magnificence 
and pride, with architecture stolen from the Greeks. 
After the Romans, the early Christians under Con- 
stant ine and Theodosius, who for some reason did 
not destroy, as was their habit, but only adapted 
the great temple to their needs. The son of Theodo- 
sius made some improvements, and above the south 
door left a Christian inscription which stands to this 
day. 

When, in 634 a.d., Damascus fell, the church was 
at first divided between Mohammedan and Christian 
worshippers — the two entering by the same gate. 
They were not so far asunder in those days — not 
farther, I think, than some of our present-day Chris- 
tian sects — so called. Seventy years later the strife 
became bitter, and the followers of Mohammed 
claimed it all. The Caliph entered the church with 
guards, smashed the Christian images, and set up 
emblems of the new faith. Then he lavished quanti- 
ties of money, making the place as splendid as 
possible, until it was more beautiful even than St. 
Sophia's. Sixteen years ago it was badly damaged 
by fire, but now it has been restored — by Christian 
workmen, Habib said. Habib, I should add, is our 
party guide — a Christian Syrian, educated in a col- 
lege at Beirut — a quite wonderful person of many 
languages. 

The mosque interior is the most beautiful place 
we have seen. Its ceiling, its windows, its mosaic 
walls, its rugs — all overwhelming in exquisite work- 

234 



The "Pearl of the East" 



manship and prodigality of design. The pictures I 
have dreamed of Aladdin's palace grow dim in this 
enchanted place. No wonder the faithful linger here 
on their way to and from Mecca; for after the long 
desert stages it is like a vision of that lavish paradise 
which their generous prophet has provided. They 
are all about — prostrating themselves with many 
genuflections and murmurings — and we step on them 
as little as possible, but they are a good deal in the 
way. The place holds ten or twelve thousand of them 
every Friday, Habib said. 

Habib, by-the-way, has small respect for the Moslem. 
Also, he does not seem to fear consequences, which I 
confess I do, being in the very stronghold of fanaticism, 
and remembering that some five thousand Christians 
were suddenly and violently destroyed in Damascus 
not so many years ago. We were in front of a very 
marvellous mosaic shrine, and Habib beckoned us 
to come closer to admire its exquisite workmanship. 
A devotee was prostrated in the little alcove, bowing 
and praying in the usual rhythmic way. We sur- 
rounded him, but were inclined to hold a little aloof. 

" Closer, closer!" urged Habib. "You must see 
it!" 

We crowded up and entangled the praying person, 
who became aware of our presence and turned up his 
face helplessly. Then he pressed it again to the floor, 
and tried to go on with his murmurings. It was no 
use. Habib jostled him, waved his pointing stick 
over his head, tapped the ornamentation within an 
inch of his nose. We were told to step up and examine 
the work closely — to touch it, smell of it. Clearly 

235 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Habib regarded that devotee no more than if he had 
been a mile removed instead of being actually against 
us. The poor pious pilgrim stole another look at us, 
this way and that, slipped a notch in his prayers, 
gathered himself and tried again, let go a whole dis- 
tich, quavered in his attempt to make himself heard, 
cast another appealing glance at the Kurfiirsters, 
broke through, and fled. This is not an exaggeration, 
but an actual happening. In America there would 
have been trouble. 

"He is nothing" said Habib, when I seemed dis- 
turbed. "He is only an Arab." Still, he was pray- 
ing to Habib 's God. 

Many persons do not realize, I believe, that Chris- 
tianity and Mohammedanism differ mainly in their 
Messiah. The Jew furnished the Moslem as well as 
the Christian with a God, patriarchs, and prophets — 
the Old Testament being common to all. The Mos- 
lem goes further than the Jew, for he accepts parts 
of the New Testament. He recognizes John the 
Baptist as a holy messenger, even claiming to have 
his head in this very church, in a shrine which we 
saw, though I could see that Habib thought the relic 
apocryphal. Furthermore, the Moslem accepts Christ! 
To him, Christ is only a lesser prophet than Moham- 
med, but still a great being — an emissary of God — 
and on this same mosque is the Minaret of Jesus, 
where, one day, as they believe, he will stand to judge 
the world. On the other hand, the average Christian 
believes that Mohammed was merely a fraud, and 
it is this difference of opinion that has reddened the 
East with blood. I am moved to set down this 

236 



The "Pearl of the East" 



paragraph of rather general information for the reason 
that it contains some things which I suppose others 
to be as ignorant of as I was — things which seem to me 
interesting. 

We did see one old book, by-the-way — fifteen 
hundred years old, Habib said, and a member of our 
party asked if it was printed on a press ; though that 
is nothing — I have done worse myself. Then we 
ascended the Minaret of the Bride for the view. 
We climbed and climbed, and got hot, and shaky in 
the knees, but the view repaid us. There was Damas- 
cus spread out in its beauty; its marble courts, its 
domes and minarets and painted houses — a magic 
city in the midst of a garden of bloom. Certainly 
this is fairyland — a mirage whose fragile fabric may 
vanish in a breath. Oh, our time is all too short! 
One must have long and long to look upon the East — 
it has taken so long to build ! 

We went to Saladin's tomb, and that is authoritative, 
though I confess that I could not realize, as we stood 
in that narrow building and viewed the catafalque in 
the centre, that the mighty Saracen hero of romance 
rested there. For me, he belongs only in tales of 
enchantment and fierce deeds, and not in that quiet 
place. I remembered that his sword was so sharp 
that a feather pillow dropped on its edge would fall 
on either side. Perhaps they have the sword there, 
and possibly the pillow to prove it, but I did not see 
them. 

A Turkish school turned out to look at us and 
smile. We looked and smiled back, and everybody 
was satisfied. It is certain that we look more strange 
16 237 



The Ship -Dwellers 



to them than they do to us, now. I know this, for 
when I stop anywhere and look over our party, here 
amid the turbans and fezzes and long flowing gar- 
ments of the Orient, I can see for myself that it is 
really our party that looks queer and fantastic and 
out of place — not these people at all. 

It is natural that one should realize this in Damas- 
cus, for Damascus is the great reality — the unchanged 
and changeless. Algiers was a framed picture ; Con- 
stantinople was a world's Midway — a sort of mas- 
querade, prepared for our benefit. Here it is different. 
No longer the country and the people constitute 
the show, but ourselves. One presently discovers 
that he is artificial — an alien, a discord — that he has 
no place here. These others are the eternal verities ; 
their clothes are the real clothes — not ours, that 
change fashion with every year and season. One 
is tempted to abjure all the fanfare and flourish of 
his so-called progress — to strip off his ridiculous gar- 
ments and customs and fall in with the long steady 
rhythm of the ages. 

Only, you don't do it. You discover objections 
to such a course. I could name some of them if I 
wanted to. Never mind; you couldn't do it anyway. 
You have been hurrying and sweating and capering 
about and wearing your funny clothes and singing 
•in false keys too long. You cannot immediately put 
on the garb of the ages, and lock step with the swing 
of a thousand years. 



XXVII 



FOOTPRINTS OF PAUL 

WE entered the "street which is called Straight," 
and came to the house of Judas, where St. Paul 
lodged when he was led blind into Damascus, trem- 
bling and astonished of the Lord. His name was 
Saul, and he had been on his way to Damascus to 
persecute the Christians, by the authority of Rome. 
The story is in the ninth chapter of Acts, and is too 
familiar to repeat here. I believe, though, most of us 
thought the house of Judas had some connection with 
the unfaithful disciple of that name, until Habib 
enlightened us. Habib said that this was another 
Judas — a good man — well-to-do for his time. The 
Street called Straight runs through the Grande Bazaar, 
and the house of Judas is in the very midst of that 
dim aggregation of trades. It is roofless and unoc- 
cupied, but it is kept clean and whitewashed, and 
its stone walls will stand for another two thousand 
years. 

Next to the birth and crucifixion of the Saviour, 
the most important event in the story of Christianity 
happened there. It seemed strange and dreamlike 
to be standing in the house of St. Paul's conver- 
sion — a place which heretofore had seemed to exist 
only in the thin leaves and fine print of our Sunday- 
school days — and I found myself wondering which 

239 



The Ship -Dwellers 



corner of the house St. Paul occupied, just where 
he sat at table, and a number of such things. Then 
I noticed the drifting throngs outside, passing and re- 
passing or idling drowsily, who did not seem to know 
that it was St. Paul's house, and paid no attention to 
it at all. 

At the house of Ananias, which came next, Habib 
was slow in arriving, and the Horse-Doctor gave us a 
preliminary lecture. 

"This," he said, "is the house of Ananias, once 
fed by the ravens. Later, through being a trifle 
careless with the truth, he became the founder and 
charter member of a club which in the United States 
of America still bears his name. Still later he was 
struck by lightning for deceiving his mother-in-law, 
Saphira, who perished at the same time to furnish 
a Scripture example that the innocent must suffer 
with the guilty (see Deuteronomy xi. 16): This is 
the spot where Ananias fell. That stone marks the 
spot where his mother-in-law stood. The hole in 
the roof was made by the lightning when it came 
through. We will now pass on to the next — " 

That was good enough gospel for our party if Habib 
had only let it alone. He came in just then and 
interrupted. He said: 

"This is the house of Ananias — called St. Ananias, 
to distinguish him from a liar by the same name. 
That Ananias and his wife, Saphira, fell dead at the 
feet of St. Peter because of falsehood, a warning to 
those who trifle with the truth to-day. St. Ananias 
was a good man, who restored St. Paul's sight and 
instructed him in the Christian doctrine." 

240 



Footprints of Paul 



We naturally avoided the Doctor for a time after 
that. His neighborhood seemed dangerous. 

The house of Ananias is below ground, and was 
probably used as a hiding-place in a day when it was 
not safe for an active and busy Christian to be at 
large. Such periods have not been unusual in 
Damascus. St. Paul preached Christianity openly, 
but not for long; for the Jews "took counsel to kill 
him," and watched the gate to see that he did not 
get away. 

"Then the disciples took him by night, and let 
him down the wall in a basket." 

We drove to the outer wall, and came to the place 
and the window where Paul is said to have been let 
dowr. It might have happened there; the wall is 
Roman, and the window above it could have been 
there in St. Paul's day. I prefer to believe it is 
the real window, though I have reason to think they 
show another one sometimes. 

Habib said we were to visit some of the handsome 
residences of Damascus. We were eager for that. 
From the Minaret of the Bride we had looked down 
upon those marble courts and gay facades, and 
had been fascinated. We drove back into the city, 
through narrow mud-walled streets, forbidding and 
not overclean. When these alleys had become so 
narrow and disheartening that we could travel only 
with discomfort, we stopped at a wretched entrance 
and were told to get out. Certainly this was never 
the portal to any respectable residence. But we were 
mistaken. The Damascus house is built from the 
inside out. It is mud and unseemly disrepute with- 

241 



The Ship -Dwellers 



out, but it is fairyland within. Every pretentious 
house is built on the same plan, and has a marble 
court, with a fountain or pool, and some peach or 
apricot or orange trees. On one side of the court 
is the front of the 'house. It has a high entrance, and 
rooms to the right and to the left — rooms that have a 
raised floor at one end (that is where the rich rugs are) 
and very high ceilings — forty feet high, some of them 
— decorated with elaborate designs. , In the first 
house the round writhing rafters were exposed, and 
the decoration on them made them look exactly like 
snakes. The Apostle took one look and fled, and I 
confess I did not care for them much myself. The 
rest of the house was divided into rooms of many 
kinds, and there was running water, and a bath. We 
visited another house, different only in details. Some 
of the occupants were at home here — women-folks 
who seemed glad to see us, and showed us about 
eagerly. A tourist party from far-off America is a 
diversion to them, no doubt. 

Then we went to still another house. We saw at 
once that it was a grander place than the two already 
visited, and we were simply bewildered at the abund- 
ance of the graven brass and inlaid furniture, rich 
rugs and general bric-a-brac, that filled a great 
reception-room. Suddenly servants in Turkish dress 
appeared with trays of liqueurs — two kinds, orange 
and violet — urging us to partake of the precious stuff, 
without stint. Also, there were trays of rare coffee 
and dainty sweetmeats, and we were invited to sit 
in the priceless chairs and to handle the wonderful 
things to our hearts' content. We were amazed, 

242 



URGING US TO PARTAKE OF THE PRECIOUS STUFF, WITHOUT 
STINT 



The Ship -Dwellers 



stunned. Oriental hospitality could go no further. 
Then in some subtle manner — I don't remember 
how the information was conveyed, but it must 
have been delicately, Orientally done — we learned 
that all this brass, all these marvellous things, were 
for sale! 

Did we buy them? Did we! David did not take 
more brass from Hadadezer than we carried out of 
that Damascus residence, which was simply an annex 
to a great brass and mosaic factory, as we discovered 
later. Perhaps those strange liqueurs got into our 
enthusiasm ; certainly I have never seen our party so 
liberal — so little inclined to haggle and hammer down. 

But the things themselves were worth while. The 
most beautiful brass in the world is made in Damascus, 
and it is made in that factory. 

They took us in where the work was going on. I 
expected to see machinery. Nothing of the sort — 
not a single machine anywhere. Every stage of the 
work is performed by hand — done in the most primi- 
tive way, by workmen sitting on the ground, shaping 
some artistic form, or with a simple graving -tool 
working out an intricate design. Many of the workers 
were mere children — girls, most of . them — some of 
them not over seven or eight years old, yet even 
these were producing work which would cause many 
an " arts and crafts" young lady in America to pale 
with envy. They get a few cents a day. The 
skilled workers, whose deft fingers and trained vision 
produce the exquisite silver inlay designs, get as 
much as a shilling. No wonder our people did not 
haggle. The things were cheap, and they knew it. 

244 



Footprints of Paul 



In a wareroom in the same factory I noticed that 
one of the walls was stone, and looked like Roman 
masonry; also that in it were the outlines of two 
high arches, walled up. I asked Habib about it. 

"Those," he said, "are two of the entrances to 
the Street called Straight. We are outside of the 
wall here ; this house is built against it. The Straight 
street had three entrances in the old days. Those 
two have long been closed." 

It always gives me a curious sensation to realize 
that actual people are living and following their daily 
occupations in the midst of associations like these. 
I can't get used to it at all. 

To them, however, it is nothing. The fact that 
they sleep and wake and pursue their drowsy round 
in places hallowed by tradition; that the house 
which sheltered St. Paul stands in the midst of their 
murmuring bazaar; that one side of this wareroom 
is the wall of the ancient city, the actual end of the 
Street called Straight; that every step they take is 
on historic ground, sacred to at least three religions — 
this to me marvellous condition is to them not strange 
at all. 

It is not that they do not realize the existence of 
these things: they do — at least, most of them do — 
and honor and preserve their landmarks. But that 
a column against which they dream and smoke may 
be one of the very columns against which St. Paul 
leaned as he groped his blind way down the Street 
called Straight is to them not a matter for wonder, or 
even comment. 

I am beginning to understand their point of view — 

245 



The Ship -Dwellers 



even to envy it. I do not envy some of the things 
they have — some of their customs — but their serenity 
of habit, their security of place in the stately march 
of time, their establishment of race and religion — one 
must envy these things when he considers them 
here, apart from that environment which we call 
civilized — the whirl which we call progress. 

I do not think I shall turn Moslem. The doctrine 
has attractive features, both here and hereafter; but 
I would not like to undertake the Koran at my time 
of life. I can, however, and I do, pay the tribute of 
respect to the sun-baked land and sun-browned race 
that have given birth to three of the world's great 
religions, even though they have not unnaturally 
claimed their last invention as their best and held it 
as their own. 



XXVIII 



DISCONTENTED PILGRIMS 

WE entered the remaining portal of the Street 
called Straight and drove to the Grand Bazaar. 
We were in a buying fever by this time, and plunged 
into a regular debauch of bargain and purchase. We 
were all a little weary when we reached the hotel. 
We came in carrying our brass and other loot, and 
dropped down on the first divan, letting our bundles 
fall where they listed. 

I thought the Apostle looked particularly solemn. 
Being a weighty person, jouncing all day in a carriage 
and walking through brass bazaars and fez bazaars 
and silk bazaars and rug bazaars and silver bazaars 
and leather bazaars and saddle bazaars, and at least 
two hundred and seven other bazaars, had told on 
him. When I spoke cheer ingly he merely grunted 
and reached for something in a glass which, if it tasted 
as it smelled, was not calculated to improve his tem- 
per. When I sat down beside him he did not seem 
over cordial. 

Then, quite casually, I asked him if he wouldn't 
execute a little commission for me in the bazaars; 
there were a few trifles I had overlooked: another 
coffee-set, for instance — something for a friend at 
home; I had faith in his (the Apostle's) taste. 

It seemed a reasonable request, and I made it 

247 



The Ship -Dwellers 



politely enough, but the Apostle became suddenly 
violent. He said: 

' ' Damn the bazaars ! I'm full of brass and Oriental 
rugs and bric-a-brac. I never want to hear of a 
bazaar again. I want to give away the junk I've 
already bought, and get back to the ship." Which 
we knew he didn't mean, for he had put in weary 
hours acquiring those things, inspired with a large 
generosity for loved ones at home. 

The Colonel came drifting along just then — un- 
ruffled, debonair — apparently unwearied by the day's 
round. Nothing disturbs the Colonel. If he should 
outwear the century, he would still be as blithe of 
speech and manner as he is to-day at — dear me, how 
old is the Colonel? Is he thirty? Is he fifty? He 
might be either of those ages or at any mile-post 
between. 

He stood now, looking down at the Apostle and his 
cup of poison. Then, with a coaxing smile: 

"Match you, Joe — my plunder against yours— 
just once." 

The Apostle looked up with a perfectly divine sneer. 

"Yes, you will — I think I see myself!" 

The Colonel slapped a coin on the table briskly. 

"Come on, Joe — we never matched for bric-a-brac 
before. Let's be game — just this time." 

What was the use ? The Apostle resisted — at first 
violently, then feebly — then he matched — and lost. 

For a moment he could hardly realize the extent 
of his disaster. Then he reached for the mixture 
in front of him, swallowed it, gagged, and choked 
alarmingly. When he could get his voice, he said: 

248 



The Ship -Dwellers 



"I'm the hellfiredest fool in Syria. I walked four 
hundred miles to buy those things." 

The Horse-Doctor regarded him thoughtfully. 

"You always interest me," he said. "I don't 
know whether it's your shape or your mental habi- 
tudes. Both are so peculiar." 

After which we left the Apostle — that is, we stood 
from under and went in to dinner. 

The Apostle is a good traveller, however — all the 
Reprobates are. They take things as they find them, 
which cannot be said for all of our people. One 
wonders what some of them expected in Damascus — 
probably steamer fare and New York hotel accommo- 
dations. I judge this from their remarks. 

As a matter of fact, we are at the best hotel in 
Damascus, and the hotel people are racking their 
bodies and risking their souls to give us the best they 
know. A traveller cannot get better than the best — 
even in heaven. Travelling alone in any strange 
land, he is more likely to get the worst. Yet the real 
traveller will make the best of what he finds, and do 
better when he finds he can. But these malcontents 
of ours have been pampered and spoiled by that 
steamer until they expect nothing short of perfection 
— their kind of perfection — wherever they set foot. 
They are so disturbed over the fact that the bill-of- 
fare is unusual and not adjusted to their tastes that 
they are not enjoying the sights, and want to clear 
out, forthwith. They have been in Damascus a 
little more than a day; they want to go now. This 
old race has stood it five thousand years or more. 
These ship-dwellers can't stand it two days without 

250 



Discontented Pilgrims 



complaint. I don't want to be severe, but such 
travellers tire me. I suppose the bill-of-fare in heaven 
won't please them. I hope not, if I'm invited to 
remain there — any length of time, I mean. 

The rest of us are having great enjoyment. We like 
everything, and we eat most of it. There are any 
number of dried fruits and nuts and fine juicy oranges 
always on the table, strung down the centre — its 
full length. And even if the meats are a bit queer, 
they are by no means bad. We whoop up the bill-of- 
fare, and go through it forward and backward and 
diagonally, working from both ends toward the centre, 
and back again if we feel like it. We have fruit and 
nuts piled by our plates and on our plates all through 
the meal. We don't get tired of Damascus. We 
could stay here and start a famine. What will these 
grumblers do in heaven, where very likely there isn't 
a single dish they ever heard of before? 

In the matter of wines, however, I am conserva- 
tive. You see, Mohammed forbade the use of spir- 
ituous beverages by the faithful, and liquor forms no 
part of their long, symphonic rhyme. They don't 
drink it themselves; they only make it for visitors. 

It would require no command of the Prophet to 
make me abstain from it. I have tried their vintage. 
I tried one brand called the ''Wine of Ephesus." 
The name conjured visions ; so did the wine, but they 
were not the same visions. The name suggested ban- 
quets in marble halls, where gentlemen and ladies 
of the old days reclined on rich divans and were 
served by slaves on bended knee. The wine itself — 
the taste of it, I mean — suggested a combination 

251 



The Ship -Dwellers 



of hard cider and kerosene, with a hurry call for the 
doctor. 

I was coy about the wines of the East after that, 
but by-and-by I tried another brand — a different 
color with a different name. This time it was ' ' Nectar 
of Heliopolis." They had curious ideas of nectar in 
Heliopolis. Still, it was better than the Wine of 
Ephesus. Hair-oil is always better than kerosene in 
a mixture like that — but not much better. The fla- 
vor did not invite debauch. 

This is Sunday (the Christian Sunday), and I have 
been out for an early morning walk. I took the trol- 
ley that starts near the hotel. I did not care for a 
trolley excursion, but I wanted to see what a Damas- 
cus trolley is like and where it went. It isn't like 
anything in particular, and it didn't go anywhere — 
not while I was on it. 

I noticed that it was divided into three sections, 
and I climbed into the front one. The conductor 
motioned to me, and I understood that I had made 
a wrong selection, somehow. A woman, veiled and 
bangled, climbed aboard just then, and I understood. 
I was in the women's section — a thing not allowed 
in Damascus. So I got back into the rear section, 
but that wouldn't do, either. The conductor was 
motioning again. 

I comprehended at length. The rear compartment 
was second class. He wanted me to go in style. So 
I got into the middle compartment and gave him a tin 
medal, and got two or three similar ones in change, 
and sat there waiting for the procession to move. 

252 



Discontented Pilgrims 



I waited a good while. There was an Arabic inscrip- 
tion on the back of the seats in front of me — in the 
place where, in America, it says, "Wait for the car 
to stop." I suppose it says, "Wait for the car to 
start" in Damascus. We did that. The conductor 
dozed. 

Now and then somebody climbed on, but the arri- 
vals were infrequent. I wondered if we were waiting 
for a load. It would take a week to fill up, at that 
rate. I looked at my watch now and then. The 
others went to sleep. That is about the difference 
between the East and the West. The West counts 
the time; for the East it has no existence. Moments, 
hours, months mean nothing to the East. The word 
hurry is not of her language. She drives her horses 
fast, but merely for pleasure, not haste. She has 
constructed this trolley, but merely for style. It 
doesn't really serve any useful purpose. 

We moved a little by-and-by, and I had hopes. 
They were premature. We crawled up in front of a 
coffee-house where a lot of turbans and fezzes were 
gathered outside, over tiny cups and hubble-bubble 
pipes; then we stopped. Our conductor and motor- 
man got off and leaned against an almond-tree and 
began gossiping with friends. Finally coffee came 
out to them, and pipes, and they squatted down to 
smoke. 

I finished my ride then; I shall always wonder 
where those other passengers thought they were 
going, and if they ever got there. 

I followed down a narrow street, and came to a 
succession of tiny work-shops. It was then I disco v- 
17 253 



The Ship -Dwellers 



ered what a man's feet are for — that is, some uses I 
had not known before. They are to assist the hands 
in performing mechanical labor. All mechanics work 
barefooted here. They sit flat on the floor or ground, 
with their various appliances in front of them, and 
there is scarcely any operation in which the feet do 
not take part. I came to a turning-lathe — a whole 
row of turning-lathes — tiny, crude affairs, down on 
the ground, of course, driven back and forth with a 
bow and a string. The workman held the bow in one 
hand, while the other hand, assisted by the foot, 
guided the cutting tool. It would never occur to 
these workmen to put the lathe higher in the air and 
attach a treadle, leaving both hands free to guide the 
tool. 

Their sawing is the crudest process imaginable. 
They have no trestles or even saw-bucks. They have 
only a slanting stick stuck in the ground, and against 
this, with their feet and one hand, they hold the piece 
to be sawed, while the other hand runs the earliest 
saw ever made — the kind Noah used when he built 
the Ark. Sometimes a sawyer has a helper — a boy 
who pushes and pulls as the saw runs back and forth. 

I bought a Sunday-morning paper. It does not 
resemble the sixty-four-page New York Sunday dailies. 
It consists of four small pages, printed in wriggly 
animalculse and other aquaria, and contains news 
four years old — or four hundred, it does not matter. 
Possibly it denounces the sultan — it is proper to do 
that just now — but I think not. That would be too 
current. I think it is still denouncing Constant ine. 



XXIX 



DAMASCUS, THE GARDEN BEAUTIFUL 

LATER, we drove to the foot of Mohammed's Hill— 
the hill from which the Prophet looked down on 
the Pearl of the East and decided that as he could 
have only one paradise he would wait for the next. 
They have built a little tower to mark the spot where 
he rested, and we thought we would climb up there. 

We didn't, however. The carriages could only go 
a little way beyond the city outskirts, and when we 
started to climb that blistering, barren hillside afoot 
we changed our minds rapidly. We had permission 
to go as high as we pleased, but it is of no value. 
Anybody could give it. Laura and I and a German 
newspaper man were the only ones who toiled up 
high enough to look down through the mystical haze 
on the vision Mohammed saw. Heavens! but it was 
hot up there ! And this is March — early spring ! 
How those Quaker City pilgrims stood it to travel 
across the Syrian desert in August I cannot imagine. 
In the Innocents I find this observation : 

4 'The sun-flames shot down like shafts of fire that 
stream out of a blowpipe. The rays seemed to fall in 
a steady deluge on my head and pass downward like 
rain from a roof." 

That is a white-hot description, but not too intense, 
I think, for Syrian summer-time. 

255 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Another thing we noticed up there: Damascus is 
growing — in that direction at least. Older than his- 
tory, the place is actually having a boom. All the 
houses out that way are new — mud-walled, but some 
of them quite pretentious. They have pushed out 
far beyond the gardens, across the barren plain, and 
they are climbing the still more barren slope. They 
stand there in the baking sun, unshaded as yet by 
any living thing. One pities the women shut up 
behind those tiny barred windows. These places will 
have gardens about them some day. Already their 
owners are scratching the earth with their crooked 
sticks, and they will plant and water and make the 
desert bloom. 

Being free in the afternoon, Laura and I engaged 
Habib and a carriage and went adventuring on our 
own account. We let Habib manage the excursion, 
and I shall always remember it as a sweet, restful 
experience. 

We visited a Moslem burying-ground first, and 
the tomb of Fatima — the original Fatima — Moham- 
med's beautiful daughter, who married a rival prophet, 
Ali, yet sleeps to-day with honor in a little mosque- 
like tomb. We passed a tree said to have been 
planted by the Mohammedan conqueror of Damascus 
nearly thirteen hundred years ago — an enormous 
tree, ten feet through or more — on one side «, hollow 
which would hold a dozen men, standing. 

Then at last we came to the gardens of Damascus, 
and got out and walked among the olive-trees and the 
peach and almond and apricot — most of them in 
riotous bloom. Summer cultivation had only just 

256 



Damascus, the Garden Beautiful 



begun, and few workmen were about. Later the gar- 
dens will swarm with them, and they will be digging and 
irrigating, and afterward gathering the fruit, preserv- 
ing and drying it, and sending it to market. Habib 
showed us the primitive methods of doing these things. 

How sweet and quiet and fragrant it was there 
among the flowering trees ! In one place a little group 
of Syrian Christians were recreating (it being Sunday), 
playing some curious dulcimer instrument and singing 
a weird hymn. 

We crossed the garden, and sat on the grass under 
the peach-bloom while Habib went for the carriage. 
Sitting there, we realized that the guide-book had 
been only fair to Damascus. 

"For miles around it is a wilderness of gardens — gardens 
with roses among the tangled shrubberies, and with fruit on 
the branches overhead. Everywhere among the trees the 
murmur of unseen rivulets is heard." 

That sounds like fairyland, but it is only Damascus 
— Damascus in June, when the fruit is ripening and 
the water-ways are full. 

We drove out of Damascus altogether — far out 
across a fertile plain, to the slopes of the West Leb- 
anon hills. Then turning, we watched the sun slip 
down the sky while Habib told us many things. 
Whatever there is to know, Habib knows, and to local- 
ities and landmarks he fitted stories and traditions 
which brought back all the old atmosphere and made 
this Damascus the Damascus of fable and dreams. 

Habib pointed out landmarks near and far — min- 
arets of the great mosque, the direction of Jerusalem, 
of Mecca ; he showed us where the waters of Damascus 

257 



The Ship -Dwellers 



rise and where they waste into the desert sands. To 
the westward was Mount Hermon ; southward came 
the lands of Naphtali, and Bashan where the giant 
Og once reigned. All below us lay Palestine; Mount 
Hermon was the watch-tower, Damascus the capital 
of the North. 

Damascus in the sunset, its domes and minarets 
lifting above the lacing green! There is no more 
beautiful picture in the world than that. We turned 
to it again and again when every other interest had 
waned — the jewel, the "pearl set in emeralds," on 
the desert's edge. Laura and I will always remem- 
ber that Sunday evening vision of the old city, the 
things that Habib told us, and the drive home. 

Next to the city itself I think the desert interested 
us. It begins just a little beyond Damascus, Habib 
said, and stretches the length of the Red Sea and to 
the Persian Gulf. A thousand miles down its length 
lies Mecca, to which pilgrims have journeyed for ages 
— a horde of them every year. There is a railway, 
now, as far as Tebook, but Mecca is still six hundred 
miles beyond. The great annual pilgrimages, made 
up of the faithful from all over Asia and portions of 
Europe and Africa, depart from Damascus, and those 
that survive it return after long months of wasting 
desert travel. Habib said that a great pilgrimage 
was returning now ; the city was full of holy men. 

Then he told us about the dromedary mail that 
crosses the desert from Damascus to Bagdad, like a 
through express. It is about five hundred miles 
across as the stork flies, but the dromedary is not 
disturbed by distance. He destroys it at the rate of 

258 



Damascus, the Garden Beautiful 



fifteen miles an hour, and capers in fresh and smiling 
at the other end. Habib did not advise dromedary 
travel. It is very rough, he said. Nothing but an 
Arab trained to the business could stand it. Once 
an Englishman wanted to go through by the drome- 
dary mail, and did go, though they implored him to 
travel in the regular way. He got through all right, 
but his liver and his heart had changed places, and 
it took three doctors seven days to rearrange his 
works. 

A multitude was pouring out of the city when we 
reached the gates — dwellers in the lands about. We 
entered and turned aside into quiet streets, the twi- 
light gathering about mysterious doorways and in 
dim shops and stalls, where were bowed, turbaned 
men who never seemed to sell anything, or to want 
to sell anything — who barely noticed us as we passed 
through the Grand Bazaar, where it was getting dark, 
and all the drowsy merchants of all the drowsy mer- 
chandise were like still shadows that only moved a 
little to let us pass. Out again into streets that were 
full of dusk, and dim flitting figures and subdued 
sounds. 

All at once I caught sight of a black stone jar 
hanging at the door of a very small and dusky booth. 
It was such a jar as is used in Damascus to-day for 
water — was used there in the time of Abraham. 

"Habib!" 

I had wanted one of the pots from the first. The 
carriage stops instantly. 

"Habib! That black water- jar — a small one!" 
I had meant to bargain for it myself, but Habib is 

259 



The Ship -Dwellers 



ahead of me. He scorns to bargain for such a trifle, 
and with such a merchant. He merely seizes the 
jar, says a guttural word or two in whatever tongue 
the man knows, flings him a paltry coin, and is back 
in the carriage, directing our course along the darken- 
ing, narrow way. 

What a wonderful life the dark is bringing out! 
There, in front of that coffee-house, that row of men 
smoking nargileh — surely they are magicians, every 
one. ' ' That silent group with shaven faces and snowy 
beards: who are they, Habib?" 

''Mongolians," he says. "Pilgrims returning from 
Mecca. They live far over to the north of China, but 
still are followers of the Prophet." The scope of 
Islamism is wide — oh yes, very wide, and increasing. 
That group gathered at the fountain — their dress, 
their faces — 

"Habib!" 

The horses come up with a jerk. 

"A copper water-jar, Habib! An old, old man is 
filling it— such a strange pattern" — 

Habib is down instantly, and amid the crowd. 
Cautiously I follow. The old man is stooped, wrin- 
kled, travel- worn. His robe and his turban are full 
of dust. He is listening to Habib and replying 
briefly. 

Habib explains. The pilgrim is returning with it 
from Mecca; it is very old; he cannot part with it. 
My heart sinks ; every word adds value to the treas- 
ure. Habib tries again, while I touch the ancient, 
curiously wrought jar lovingly. The pilgrim draws 
away. He will hardly allow me even this comfort. 

260 



Damascus, the Garden Beautiful 



We return to the carriage sadly. The driver starts. 
Some one comes running behind, calling. Again we 
stop; a boy calls something to Habib. 

"He will sell," Habib laughs, "and why not? 
He demands a napoleon. Of course you will not 
give it!" 

Oh, coward heart! I cannot, after that. I have 
the napoleon and the desire, but I cannot appear a 
fool before Habib. 

"No, it is too much. Drive on." 

We dash forward; the East closes behind us; the 
opportunity is forever lost. 

If one could only be brave at the instant ! All my 
days shall I recall the group at the fountain: that 
bent, travel - stained pilgrim; that strangely fash- 
ioned water - pot which perhaps came down to him 
from patriarchal days. How many journeys to Mecca 
had it made; how many times had it moistened the 
parching lips of some way-worn pilgrim dragging 
across the burning sand; how many times had it 
furnished water for absolution before the prayer in 
the desert! And all this could have been mine. For 
a paltry napoleon I could have had the talisman for 
my own — all the wonder of the East, its music, its 
mystery, its superstition ; I could have fondled it and 
gazed on it and re-created each picture at a touch. 

Oh, Habib, Habib, may the Prophet forgive you; 
for, alas, I never can! 

At the station next morning a great horde of pil- 
grims were waiting for the train which would bear 
them to Beirut — Mongolians, many of them, who had 
been on the long, long, pilgrimage over land and 

261 



The Ship -Dwellers 



sea. At Beirut, we were told, seven steamers were 
waiting to take them on the next stage of their 
homeward journey. What a weary way they had 
yet to travel! 

They were all loaded down with baggage. They 
had their bundles, clothing, quilts, water-bottles: 
and I wandered about among them vainly hoping to 
find my pilgrim of the copper pot. Hopeless, in- 
deed. There were pots in plenty, but they were all 
new or unsightly things. 

All the pilgrims were old men, for the Moslem, like 
most of the rest of us, puts off his spiritual climax 
until he has acquired his material account. He has 
to, in fact; for, even going the poorest way and main- 
ly afoot, a journey of ten or twelve thousand miles 
across mountain and desert, wilderness and wave can- 
not be made without substance. 

We took a goodly number of them on our train. 
Freight-cars crowded with them were attached behind, 
and we crawled across the mountains with that cargo 
of holy men, who poured out at every other station 
and prostrated themselves, facing Mecca, to pray for 
our destruction. At least, I suppose they did that. 
I know they made a most imposing spectacle at' their 
devotions, and the Moslem would hardly overlook 
an enemy in such easy praying distance. 

However, we crossed the steeps, skirted the 
precipices safely enough, and by-and-by a blue harbor 
lay below, and in it, like a fair picture, the ship — 
home. We had been gone less than a week — it 
seemed a year. 



XXX 



WHERE PILGRIMS GATHER IN 

AT some time last night we crossed over the spot 
l where the Lord stirred up a mighty tempest and 
a great fish to punish Jonah, and this morning at day- 
break we were in the harbor of Jaffa, "the beautiful," 
from which port Jonah sailed on that remarkable 
cruise. 

We were not the only ones there. Two other great 
excursion steamers lay at anchor, the Arabic and the 
M oltke, their decks filled with our fellow-countrymen, 
and I think the several parties of ship -dwellers took 
more interest in looking at one another, and in com- 
paring the appearance of their respective vessels, than 
in the rare vision of Jaffa aglow with morning. Three 
ship-loads at once ! It seemed like a good deal of an 
invasion to land on these sacred shores. But then 
we remembered how many invasions had landed at 
Jaffa — how Alexander and Titus had been there be- 
fore us, besides all the crusades — so a modest scourge 
like ours would hardly matter. As for that military 
butcher, Napoleon, who a little more than a century 
ago murdered his way through this inoff ending land, 
he shot four thousand Turkish prisoners here on 
the Jaffa sands, after accepting their surrender under 
guarantee of protection. We promised ourselves that 
we would do nothing like that. We might destroy 

263 



The Ship-Dwellers 




THE PATRIARCH KNEW ALL ABOUT JAFFA 



a pedler now and then, or a baksheesh fiend; but 
four thousand, even of that breed, would be too heavy 
a contract. 

The Patriarch knew all about Jaffa. It is one of 
his special landmarks, being the chief seaport of the 
Phcenicians, the one place they never really surren- 
dered. A large share of the vast traffic that went in 
and out of Palestine in the old days went by Jaffa, 
and a great deal goes that way still. The cedar- 
wood from Lebanon, used in Solomon's Temple, was 
brought by water to this port ; the treasure and rich 
goods that went down to Jerusalem in the day of her 
ancient glory all came this way; her conquerors 
landed here. The blade and brand prepared for 

264 



V 

Where Pilgrims Gather In 



Jerusalem were tried experimentally on Jaffa. Ac- 
cording to Josephus, eighty thousand of her inhabi- 
tants perished at one time. Yet Jaffa has survived. 
Her harbor, which is not really a harbor at all, but 
merely an anchorage, with a landing dangerous and 
uncertain, has still been sufficient to keep her the 
chief seaport of Judea. 

There is another reason for Jaffa's survival. Be- 
yond her hills lie the sacred cities of Jerusalem and 
Bethlehem. The fields that knew Ruth and Ben- 
jamin and a man named Jesus lie also there. From 
Jaffa in every direction stretch lands made memorable 
by stories and traditions in which the God and the 
prophets of at least three religions are intimately 
concerned. So during long centuries Jaffa has been 
a holy gateway, and through its portals the tide 
of pilgrimage has never ceased to flow. 

Some of us who were to put in full time in Egypt 
would have only a few days in the Holy Land, and 
we were off the ship presently, being pulled through 
the turquoise water by boatmen who sang a barbaric 
chorus as they bent over their huge, clumsy oars. 
Then we were ashore and in carriages, and in another 
moment were " jumping through Jaffa," as one of the 
party expressed it, in a way that made events and 
landmarks flit together like the spokes of a wheel. 

We visited the tomb of Dorcas, whom Peter raised 
from the dead, though for some reason we did not 
feel a positive conviction that it was the very tomb — 
perhaps because we did not have time to get up a 
conviction — and we called at the house of Simon the 
Tanner. It was with Simon, "whose house is by the 

265 



The Ship -Dwellers 



seaside," that Peter lodged when he had his ''vision 
of tolerance," in which it was made known to him that 
"God is no respecter of persons, but only of righteous- 
ness." It is truly by the seaside, and there is an 
ancient-tanner's vat in the court-yard. But I hope the 
place was cleaner when Peter lodged there than it is 
now. One had to step carefully, and, though it did 
not smell of a tanyard, it did of several other things. 
Many travellers, including Dean Stanley, have ac- 
cepted this as the veritable house where Simon dwelt 
and St. Peter lodged. Those people ought to get to- 
gether and have it cleaned up. I could believe in 
it then myself. 

Jaffa, as a whole, could stand the scrub-brush and 
the hose. It is not "the beautiful" from within. It 
is wretchedly unbeautiful, though just as we were 
getting ready to leave it we did have one genuine 
vision. From the enclosures of the Greek Church 
we looked across an interminable orange-grove, in 
which the trees seemed mere shrubs, but were literally 
massed with golden fruit — the whole blending away 
into tinted haze and towering palms. No blight, no 
vileness, no inodorous breath, but only the dreamlit 
mist and the laden trees — the Orient of our long ago. 

One might reasonably suppose that, as often as 
parties like ours travel over the railway that potters 
along from Jaffa to Jerusalem, there would be no 
commotion, no controversy with the officials — that 
the guard would only need to come in and check up 
our tickets and let us go. 

Nothing of the kind ; every such departure as ours 

266 



Where Pilgrims Gather In 



is a function, an occasion — an entirety new proposi- 
tion, to be considered and threshed out in a separate 
and distinct fashion. Before we were fairly seated 
in the little coach provided, dark-skinned men came 
in one after another to look us over and get wildly 
excited — over our beauty, perhaps ; I could discover 
nothing else unusual about us. They would wave their 
hands and carry on, first inside and then on the 
platform, where they would seem to settle it. When 
they had paid us several visits of this kind, they 
locked us in and went away, and we expected to 
start. 

Not at all; they came back presently and did it 
all over again, only louder. Then our dragoman 
appeared, and bloodshed seemed imminent. When 
they went away again he said it was nothing — just 
the usual business of getting started. 

By-and-by some of us discovered that our bags 
had not been put on the train, so we drifted out to 
look for them. We found them here and there, 
with from two to seven miscreants battling over 
each as to which should have the piastre or two of 
baksheesh collectible for handing our things from 
the carriage to the train. Such is the manner of 
graft in the Holy Land. It lacks organization and 
does not command respect. 

The station was a hot, thirsty place. We loaded 
up with baskets of oranges, the great, sweet, juicy 
oranges of Jaffa — the finest oranges in the world, I am 
sure — then we forgot all our delays and troubles, 
for we were moving out through the groves and gar- 
dens of the suburbs, entering the Plains of Sharon — 

267 



The Ship -Dwellers 



"a fold for flocks, a fertile land, blossoming as the 
rose." 

That old phrase expresses it exactly. I have never 
seen a place that so completely conveyed the idea 
of fertility as those teeming, haze-haunted plains of 
Sharon. Level as a floor, the soil dark, loose, and 
loamy; here green with young wheat, there populous 
with labor — men and women, boys and girls, dressed 
in the old, old dress, tilling the fields in the old, old 
manner; flocks and herds tended by such shepherds 
as saw the Star rise over Bethlehem; girls carrying 
water - jars on their heads ; camel trains swinging 
across the horizon — a complete picture of primal 
husbandry, it was — a vast allegory of increase. I have 
seen agricultural and pastoral life on a large scale in 
America, where we do all of the things with machin- 
ery and many of them with steam, and would find it 
hard to plough with a camel and a crooked stick; 
but I have somehow never felt such a sense of tillage 
and production — of communing with mother earth 
and drawing life and sustenance from her bosom — as 
came to me there crossing the Plains of Sharon, the 
garden of Syria. 

It is a goodly tract for that country — about fifty 
miles long and from six to fifteen wide. The tribes 
of Dan and Manasseh owned it in the old days, and 
to look out of the car-window at their descendants 
is to see those first families that Joshua settled there, 
for they have never changed. 

Our dragoman began to point out sites and land- 
marks. Here was the Plain of Joshua, where Samson 
made firebrands of three hundred foxes and destroyed 

268 



Where Pilgrims Gather In 



the standing corn of the Philistines. The tower 
ahead is at Ramleh, and was built by the crusaders 
nearly a thousand years ago — Ramleh being the 
Arimathea where lived Joseph, who provided the 
Saviour with a sepulchre. Also, it is said to be the 
place where in the days when Samuel judged Israel 
the Jews besought him for a king, and acquired Saul 
and the line of David and Solomon as a result. To 
the eastward lies the Valley of Ajalon, where Joshua 
stopped the astronomical clock for the only time in 
a million ages, that he might slaughter some remain- 
ing Amorites before dark. 

We are out of the Plains of Sharon by this time, 
running through a profitless-looking country, mostly 
rock and barren, hardly worth fighting over, it would 
seem. ■ Yet there were plenty of people to be killed 
here in the old days, and as late as fifteen hundred 
years after Joshua the Roman Emperor Hadrian 
slaughtered so many Jews at Bittir (a place we shall 
pass presently) that the horses waded to their nostrils 
in blood, and a stone weighing several pounds was 
swept along by the ruby tide. The guide told us this, 
and said if we did not believe it he could produce the 
stone. 

Landmarks fairly overlap one another. Here, at 
Hill Gezer, are the ruins of an ancient city presented 
to Solomon by one of his seven hundred fathers-in- 
law. Yonder at Ekron so much history has been 
made that a chapter would be required to record even 
a list of the events. Ekron was one of the important 
cities which Joshua did not capture, perhaps because 
he could not manage the solar system permanently. 
18 269 



The Ship -Dwellers 



The whole route fairly bristles with Bible names, and 
we are variously affected. When we are shown the 
footprints of Joshua and Jacob and David and Solo- 
mon we are full of interest. When we recall that this 
is also the land of Phut and Cush and Buz and Jid- 
laph and Pildash we are moved almost to tears. 

For those last must have been worthy men. The 
Bible records nothing against them, which is more 
than can be said of the others named. Take Jacob, 
for instance. I have searched carefully, and I fail 
to find anything to his credit beyond the fact that 
he procreated the Lord's chosen people. I do find 
that he deceived his father, defrauded his brother, 
outmanoeuvred his rascally father-in-law, and was a 
craven at last before Esau, who had been rewarded 
for his manhood and forgiveness and wrongs by being 
classed with the Ishmaelites, a name that carries with 
it a reproach to this day. 

Then there is Solomon. We need not go into the 
matter of his thousand wives and pretty favorites. 
Long ago we condoned that trifling irregularity as 
incident to the period — related in some occult but 
perfectly reasonable way to great wisdom. No, the 
wives are all right — also the near-wives, we have 
swallowed those, too; but then there comes in his 
heresy, his idolatry — all those temples built to hea- 
then gods when he had become magnificent and 
mighty and full of years. There was that altar 
which he set up to Moloch on the hill outside of 
Jerusalem (called to this day the Hill of Offence), 
an altar for the sacrifice of children by fire. Even 
Tiberius Cassar and Nero did not go as far as that. 

270 



Where Pilgrims Gather In 



I'm sorry, and I shall be damned for it, no doubt, 
but I think, on the whole, in the language of the Diplo- 
mat, I shall have to ''pass Solomon up." Never 
mind about the other two. Joshua's record is good 
enough if one cares for a slayer of women and children, 
and David was a poet — a supreme poet, a divine poet 
— which accounts for a good deal. Still, he did not 
need to put the captured Moabites under saws and 
harrows of iron and make them walk through brick- 
kilns, as described in II. Samuel xii: 31, to be pictu- 
resque. Neither did he need to kill Uriah the Hittite 
in order to take his wife away from him. Uriah 
would probably have parted with her on easier terms. 

It is sad enough to reflect that the Bible, in its good, 
old, relentless way, found it necessary to record such 
things as these against our otherwise Sunday-school 
heroes and models. Nothing of the sort is set down 
against Buz and Cush and Phut and Pildash and 
Jidlaph. Very likely they were about perfect. I 
wish I knew where they sleep. 

The nearer one approaches Jerusalem the more 
barren and unproductive becomes the country. 
There are olive-groves and there are cultivated 
fields, but there are more of flinty hillsides and rocky 
steeps. The habitations are no longer collected in 
villages, in the Syrian fashion, but are scattered 
here and there, with wide sterile places between. 
There would seem to be not enough good land in any 
one place to support a village. 

I suppose this is the very home of baksheesh. I 
know at every station mendicants, crippled and blind 
— always blind — come swarming about, holding up 



The Ship-Dwellers 



piteous hands and repeating endlessly the plaintive 
wail, "Baksheesh! bak-sheesh!" One's heart grows 
sick and hard by turns. There are moments when 
you long for the wealth of a Rockefeller to give 
all these people a financial standing, and there are 
moments when you long for a Gatling-gun to turn 
loose in their direction. We are only weak and hu- 
man. We may pity the hungry fly ever so much, but 
we destroy him. 

I think, by-the-way, some of these beggars only cry 
baksheesh from habit, and never expect to get any- 
thing. I think so, because here and there groups of 
them stand along the railway between stations, and 
hold out their hands, and voice the eternal refrain as 
we sweep by. It is hardly likely that any one ever 
flings anything out of a car-window. Pity becomes 
too sluggish in the East to get action as promptly 
as that. 

It was toward evening when we ran into a rather 
modern little railway station, and were told that 
we were "there." We got out of the train then, and 
found ourselves in such a howling mob of humanity 
as I never dreamed could gather in this drowsy land. 
We were about the last party of the season, it seems, 
and the porters and beggars and cabmen and general 
riffraff* were going to make the most of us. We were 
seized and dragged and torn and lifted — our dragoman 
could keep us together about as well as one cowboy 
could handle a stampeded herd. I have no distinct 
recollection of how we managed to reach the carriages, 
but the first words I heard after regaining conscious- 
ness were: 

272 



Where Pilgrims Gather In 



"That pool down there is where Solomon was 
anointed king." 

I began to take notice then. We were outside a 
range of lofty battlemented walls, approaching a wide 
gate flanked by an imposing tower that might belong 
to the Middle Ages. We looked down on the squalid 
pool of Gihon, and I tried to visualize the scene of 
Solomon's coronation there, which I confess I found 
difficult. Then we turned to the tower and the en- 
trance to the Holy City. 

' We were entering Jerusalem by the Jaffa gate, and 
the tower was the Tower of David. 



XXXI 



THE HOLY CITY 

THIRTY-NINE hundred years ago it was called 
merely Salem, and was ruled over by Melchisedek, 
who feasted Abraham when he returned from punishing 
the four kings who carried off his nephew, Lot. Five 
hundred years later, when Joshua ravaged Canaan, 
the place was known as Jebusi, the stronghold of 
the Jebusi tes, a citadel "enthroned on a mountain 
fastness" which Joshua failed to conquer, in spite of 
the traditional promise to Israel. Its old name had 
been not altogther dropped, and the transition from 
Jebusi-salem to Jebu-salem and Jerusalem naturally 
followed. 

It was four hundred years after Joshua's time that 
David brought the head of Goliath to Jerusalem, 
and fifteen years later, when he had become king, 
he took the "stronghold of Zion," smote the difficult 
Jebusite even to the blind and the lame, and named 
the place the City of David. 

"And David said on that day, whosoever getteth 
up to the gutter and smite th the Jebusites, and the 
lame and the blind, that are hated of David's soul, he 
shall be chief and captain." 

That is not as cruel as it sounds. Those incapables 
had no doubt been after David for baksheesh, and 
he felt just that way. I would like to appoint a 

274 



The Holy City 



few chiefs and captains of Jerusalem on the same 
terms. 

But I digress. The Bible calls it a "fort," and it 
was probably not much more than that until David 
"built round about" and turned it into a city, the 
fame of which extended to Hiram, King of Tyre, 
who sent carpenters and masons and materials to 
David and built him a house. After which "David 
took him some more concubines and wives out of 
Jerusalem," brought up the Ark of the Covenant 
'from Kirjath-jearim, and prepared to live happy 
ever after. The Ark was, of course, very sacred, and 
one Uzzah was struck dead on the way up from Kir- 
jath for putting out his hand to save it when it was 
about to roll into a ditch. 

It was with David that the glory of Jerusalem as 
a city began. Then came Solomon — David's second 
son by Uriah's wife — wise, masterful, and merciless, 
and Jerusalem became one of the magnificent cities 
of the world. Under Solomon the Hebrew race 
became more nearly a nation then ever before or 
since. Solomon completed the Temple begun by 
David on Mount Moriah; the Ark of the Covenant 
was duly installed. Judaism had acquired head- 
quarters — Israel, organization, and a capital. 

The fame of the great philosopher-poet-king 
spread to the ends of the earth. The mighty from 
many lands came to hear his wisdom and to gaze 
upon the magnificence of his court. The Queen 
of vSheba drifted in from her far sunlit kingdom with 
offerings of gold, spices, and precious stones. And 
"she communed with him of all that was in her 

275 



The Ship -Dwellers 



heart." That was more than a thousand years 
before Christ. Greece had no history then. Rome 
had not been even considered. Culture and splen- 
dor were at high-tide in the Far East. It was the 
golden age of Jerusalem. 

The full tide must ebb, and the waning in Jerusalem 
began early. Solomon's reign was a failure at the 
end. Degenerating into a sensualist and an idolater, 
his enemies prevailed against him. The Lord * ' stirred 
up an adversary" in Hadad the Edomite, who had an 
old grudge. Also others, and trouble followed. The 
nation was divided. Revolt, civil wars, and abound- 
ing iniquities dragged the people down. That which 
would come to Rome a thousand years later came 
now on a smaller scale to Israel. Egyptian and Ara- 
bian ravaged it by turns, and the Assyrian came down 
numerously. It became the habit of adjoining na- 
tions to go over and plunder and destroy Jerusalem. 

Four hundred years after Solomon, Josiah under- 
took to rehabilitate the nation and restore its ancient 
faith. He pulled down the heathen altars which 
Solomon had constructed, "that no man might make 
his son or daughter pass through the fire to Moloch" ; 
he drove out and destroyed the iniquitous priests; 
he burned the high places of pollution and stamped 
the powder in the dust. 

It was too late. Josiah was presently slain in a 
battle with the Egyptians, and his son dropped back 
into the evil practices of his fathers. Nebuchad- 
nezzar came then, and in one raid after another ut- 
terly destroyed Jerusalem, including the Temple and 
the Ark, and carried the inhabitants, to the last man, 

276 



The Holy City 



into a captivity which lasted seventy years. Then 
Nehemiah was allowed to return with a large following 
and rebuild the city. But its prosperity was never 
permanent. The Jews were never a governing na- 
tion. Discontented and factional, they invited con- 
quest. Alexander came, and, later, Rome. Herod 
the Great renewed and beautified the city, and to 
court favor with the Jews rebuilt the Temple on a 
splendid scale. This was Jerusalem in its final glory. 
Seventy years later the Jews rebelled, and Titus 
destroyed the city so completely that it is said to 
have remained a barren waste without a single in- 
habitant for fifty years. 

To-day the city is divided into " quarters" — Chris- 
tian, Jewish, Mohammedan, and Armenian. All wor- 
ships are permitted, and the sacred relics — most of 
them — of whatever faith, are accessible to all. Such 
in scanty outline is the story of the Holy City. It 
has been besieged and burned and pulled down no 
less than sixteen times — totally destroyed and rebuilt 
at least eight times, and the very topography of its 
site has been changed by the accumulation of rubbish. 
Hillsides have disappeared. Where once were hollows 
are now mere depressions or flats. Most of the streets 
that Jesus and the prophets trod lie from thirty to a 
hundred feet below the present surface, and bear little 
relation even in direction to those of the present day. 
Yet certain sites and landmarks have been identified, 
while others are interesting for later reasons. 

Hence, both to sceptic and believer, Jerusalem is 
still a shrine. 



XXXII 



THE HOLY SEPULCHRE 

WE lost no time. Though it was twilight when 
we reached our hotel, we set out at once to 
visit the spot which for centuries was the most sacred 
in all Christendom — that holiest of holies which dur- 
ing two hundred years summoned to its rescue tide 
after tide of knightly crusaders, depleted the chivalry 
and changed the map of Europe — the Church of the 
Holy Sepulchre. 

This, at least, would be genuine in so far as it 
was the spot toward which the flower of knighthood 
marched — Godfrey of Bouillon, Richard of the 
Lion Heart, Ivanhoe, and all the rest — under the 
banner of the Cross, with the cry "God wills it" on 
their lips. We are eager to see that precious land- 
mark. 

It was only a little way — nothing is far in Jerusalem 
— and we walked. We left the narrow street in front 
of the hotel and entered some still narrower ones 
where there were tiny booths of the Oriental kind, 
and nickering lights, and curious, bent figures, and 
donkeys; also steps that we went up or down, gen- 
erally down, which seemed strange when we were 
going to Calvary, because we had always thought 
Calvary a hill. 

It was impressive, though. We were in Jerusalem, 

278 



The Holy Sepulchre 



and if these were not the very streets that Jesus trod, 
surely they were not unlike them, for the people have 
not changed, nor their habits, nor their architecture 
— at least, not greatly — nor their needs. Whatever 
was their cry for baksheesh then, He must often 
have heard it, and their blind eyes and their withered 
limbs were such as He once paused to heal. 

I think we continued to descend gradually to the 
very door of the church. It did not seem quite like 
the entrance to a church, and, in. reality, it is not 
altogether that; it is more a repository, a collection 
of sacred relics, a museum of scriptural history. 

We paused a little outside while the guide — his 
name was something that meant St. George — told 
us briefly the story. Constantine's mother, the Em- 
press Helena, he said, through a dream had located 
the site of the crucifixion and burial of the Saviour, 
whereupon Constantine, in 335 a.d., had erected 
some buildings to mark the place. The Persians de- 
stroyed these buildings by-and-by, but they were re- 
built. Then the Moslems set fire to the place; but 
again some chapels were set up, and these the con- 
quering crusaders enclosed under one great roof. 
This was about the beginning of the twelfth century, 
and portions of the buildings still remain, though as 
late as 1808 there came a great fire which necessitated 
a general rebuilding, with several enlargements since, 
as the relics to be surrounded have increased. 

We went inside then. The place is dimly lit — it is 
always lit, I believe, for it can never be very light 
in there — and everywhere there seemed to be flitting 
processions of tapers, and of chanting, dark-robed 

279 



The Ship -Dwellers 



priests. Just beyond the entrance we came to the 
first great relic — the Stone of Unction — the slab 
upon which the body of Christ was laid when it was 
taken down from the Cross. It is red, or looked red 
in that light, like a piece of Tennessee marble, and, 
though it is not smoothly cut, it is polished with the 
kisses of devout pilgrims who come far to pay this 
tribute, and to measure it, that their winding-sheets 
may be made the same size. Above it hang a number 
of lamps and candelabra, and with the worshippers 
kneeling and kissing and measuring, the spectacle was 
sufficiently impressive. Then, as we were about to 
go, our guide remembered that this was not the 
true Stone of Unction, but one like it, the real stone 
having been buried somewhere beneath it. The pil- 
grims did not know the difference, he said, and they 
used up a stone after a while, kissing and measuring 
it so much. Near to the stone is the Station of Mary, 
where she stood while the body of Jesus was being 
anointed, or perhaps where she stood watching the 
tomb — it is not certain which. At all events, it has 
been revealed by a vision that she stood there, and 
the place is marked and enclosed with a railing. 

We followed our guide deeper into the twinkling 
darkness, where the chanting processions were flick- 
ering to and fro, and presently stood directly beneath 
a dome, facing an ornate marble or alabaster struct- 
ure, flanked and surrounded by elaborately wrought 
lamps and candlesticks — the Holy Sepulchre itself. 

But I had to be told. I should never have guessed 
this to be the shrine of shrines, the receptacle of the 
gentle Nazarene who taught the doctrine of humility 

280 



The Holy Sepulchre 



to mankind. And it is the same within. If a rock- 
hewn tomb is there, it is overlaid now with costly 
marbles; polished with kisses; bedewed with tears. 

We did not remain in the tomb long, Laura and I. 
Perhaps they would not have let us; but, in any 
case, we did not wish to linger. At Damascus, Laura 
had gone so far as to criticise the house of Judas, be- 
cause it had been whitewashed since St. Paul lodged 
there. So it was not likely that a tomb which was 
not a tomb, but merely a fancy marble memorial, 
would inspire much enthusiasm. To us it contained 
no suggestion of the gentle Prince of Peace. 

But at the entrance of the Sepulchre, facing us as 
we came out, there was a genuine thing. It was a 
woman kneeling, a peasant woman — of Russia, I 
suppose, from her dress. And she was not looking 
at us at all, but beyond us, through us, into that little 
glowing interior which to her was shining with the 
very light of the Lamb. I have never seen another 
face with an expression like that. It was fairly lu- 
minous with rapt adoration. Yes, she at least was 
genuine — an absolute embodiment of the worship that 
had led. her along footsore and weary miles to kneel 
at last at the shrine of her faith. 

I am not going to weary the reader with detailed 
description of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. It 
is a vast place, and contains most of the sacred relics 
and many of the sacred sites that have been identified 
since the zealous Queen Helena set the fashion of 
seeing visions and dreaming dreams. We made the 
tour of a number of the chapels of different religious 
denominations. They are not on good terms with 

281 



The Ship -Dwellers 



one another, by-the-way, and require Mohammedan 
guards to keep them from fighting around the very 
Sepulchre itself. Then we descended some stairs to 
the Chapel of St. Helena, where there is an altar to 
the penitent thief, and another to Queen Helena, 
though I did not learn that she ever repented, or 
even reformed. 

They showed us where the Queen sat when, pur- 
suing one of her visions, they were digging for the 
true Cross and found all three of them; and they 
told us how they identified the holy one by sending 
all three to the bedside of a noble lady who lay at 
the point of death. The first shown her made her 
a maniac; the second threw her into spasms; the 
third cured her instantly. The commemoration of 
this event is called in the calendar "The Invention 
of the Cross," which seems to convey the idea. I 
think it was in the Chapel of the Finding of the Cross 
that I bought a wax candle, and a prayer went with 
it, though whether it was for my soul or Queen 
Helena's I am not certain. It does not matter. I 
am willing Helena should have it, if she needs it, and 
I think she does. 

We went on wandering around, and by-and-by we 
came to a chapel where the Crown of Thorns was 
made, and presently to a short column marking the 
Centre of the Earth, the spot from which the dust 
was taken that was used in making Adam. You see, 
it is necessary to double up on some of the land- 
marks or enlarge the church again. 

You can climb a flight of stairs in the Church of 
the Holy Sepulchre and be told that you are on 

282 



The Holy Sepulchre 



Calvary, and you are allowed to put your hand 
through the floor into the sockets where the crosses 
stood. We did not do it, however. We climbed the 
stairs, but a collection of priests were holding some 
kind of ceremony with candles and chanting, and we 
were not sufficiently impressed to wait. 

We did pause, as we came away, to note in the 
vestibule of the Holy Sepulchre the two holes through 
which on Easter Eve the Holy Fire is distributed to 
Christian pilgrims who assemble from all parts of the 
world. On this occasion the Fire Bishop enters the 
Sepulchre, and fire from heaven lights the candles on 
the altar. Then the Bishop, who is all alone in the 
Sepulchre, passes the Holy Fire out through these 
holes, in the form of a bundle of burning tapers, to 
priests. The pilgrims with unlighted tapers then 
rush and jam and scramble toward these dispensers 
of the sacred flame and pay any price demanded to 
have their candles speedily lighted. Usually a riot 
takes place, and the Mohammedan guards are re- 
quired to prevent bloodshed. 

In 1834 there occurred a riot over the Holy Fire 
which piled the dead five feet deep around the Sepul- 
chre. Four or five hundred were killed, and corpses 
lay thick even on the Stone of Unction. It seems a 
useless sacrifice, when one thinks of it, but then the 
blood of five hundred is only a drop as compared with 
what the centuries have contributed to this revered 
shrine. 

I want to be quite serious for a moment about the 
Church of the Holy Sepulchre — here in Jerusalem — 
now, while I am in the spirit of the thing. 

283 



The Ship -Dwellers 



It is the biggest humbug in all Christendom. Of 
the scores of sites and relics enclosed within its walls, 
it is unlikely that a single one is genuine. With all 
respect to Queen Helena's talent for dreams, her 
knowledge of Scripture must have been sparing, or 
she would have located Calvary outside the walls of 
Jerusalem. This place is in the heart of the city — 
was always in the heart of the city, in spite of all 
gerrymandering to prove it otherwise; and it was 
more of a flat or a hollow in the time of Christ than 
it is now. 

As for the other traditions and trumpery gathered 
in this ecclesiastical side-show, they are unworthy of 
critical attention. Probably not one in a million of 
the readers of Innocents A broad but thought the find- 
ing of the Grave of Adam one of Mark Twain's 
jokes. Not at all; it is located here under Cal- 
vary, and the place from which came Adam's dust 
(the Centre of the World) is close by. Then there is 
that Stone of Unction, which every one of intelligence 
knows to be a fraud, and there is the stone which the 
angel rolled away, and Adam's skull — they have that, 
too. 

It would seem that the human animal had ex- 
hausted his simian inheritance then. But no, he can 
never exhaust that — it is his one limitless gift. He 
has gone right on adding to his heap of bones and 
crockery, enlarging the museum from time to time 
to make room. And he will add more. The future 
is long, and it is only a question of time and faith 
when he will bring over the tombs of the patriarchs 
from Hebron, the Grotto of the Nativity from Beth- 

284 



The Holy Sepulchre 



lehem, the House of Judas from Damascus, and the 
Street that was called Straight. Oh, he can do it! 
A creature who can locate the Holy Sepulchre, the 
Grave of Adam, the Centre of the World, Mount Cal- 
vary, and fifty other historical sites all within the 
radius of a few feet, and find enough of his own kind 
to accept them, can do anything. As an insult to 
human intelligence and genuine Christian faith, I 
suppose this institution stands alone. 

Do the priests themselves, the beneficiaries, believe 
it? Perhaps — at least some of them do. There is 
nothing so dense, so sodden, so impenetrable as 
priestly superstition. Not a ray of reason can enter 
a mind darkened for a lifetime by ceremonials in 
which candles, chantings, swinging censers, and pros- 
trations are regarded as worship. Could you pro- 
duce any evidence that would appeal to the minds 
of those figures that march and countermarch, and 
carry tapers and chant among these frauds and frip- 
peries of their faith? Hardly — they would not care 
for evidence. What they want is more superstition; 
more for themselves — more, always more, for their 
followers ; the more superstition, the more power, the 
more baksheesh. They have no use for facts and 
testimony. They can create both to fit the need. 
Let any corner of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre 
become vacant, and immediately some prelate will 
dream that it is the true place where Balaam's Ass 
saw the angel with the flaming sword, and they will 
promptly consecrate the spot; then they will ex- 
cavate and find the sword and a footprint of the angel, 
also a piece of the Ass, and they will make a saint of 
19 28 5 



The Ship-Dwellers 



Balaam, and very likely of the Ass, and they will set 
up an altar and get a sign-painter to make a picture 
of the vision, and the people will contribute prayers 
and piastres, and yell baksheesh at every traveller 
to keep the high priests of Balaam in food and funds. 

Strange that we who regard the Mohammedan pil- 
grim with disdain or compassion, on his journey to 
Mecca and Medina, excuse or condone the existence 
of a shrine like this. The Prophet's birthplace and 
tomb are at least authentic, and it was his desire that 
his followers should visit them. They are acknowl- 
edging a fact. These people are supporting a fraud. 

And then the pity of it ! The remembering that it 
was for this trumpeiy thing those mighty crusades 
swept like a flame across Europe, robbed her of her 
chivalry, and desolated a million homes ; for this that 
gallant knights put on their armor and rode away 
under the banner of the Cross, shouting, "God wills 
it!" For this that men have drenched more than 
one nation with blood and changed the map and his- 
tory of the world! 

True, one may not altogether regret the crusades. 
They made romance and the high achievement to 
be celebrated in picture and in song. It was fine, 
indeed, to ride away in shining mail in a vast army 
in which all were officers — splendid knights battling 
for glory in a cause. Aching hearts and forsaken 
homes were plentiful behind, yet even they reflected 
the glamour of romance, the fervor of a faith. 

But there was one crusade in which there was 
neither romance nor glory — nothing except heart- 
break and anguish, and the long torture of the years. 

286 



The Holy Sepulchre 



That was the Children's Crusade — the crusade 
in which fanaticism spelled its last word — when 
a countless number of children of all ages, as young 
as seven some of them, flocked to the standard of a 
boy of seventeen and wandered off down through 
Europe, to faint and fall and die by hundreds and 
by thousands from hunger and heat and thirst — 
moaning and grieving unheeded among the stones 
and bushes — to reach the Mediterranean at last, a 
scattered remnant, there to be taken on board some 
vessels and sold into slavery in Algiers! 

There was no glory, no triumph however imaginary, 
in that crusade; no romance, no glamour after the 
first day's march. It was only weariness and torture 
after that — only wretchedness and the fevered cry 
for the comfort of a mother's arm. And all for the 
sake of this dime-museum of faith, this huge ecclesi- 
astical joke. The pity of it, indeed! Here to-night, 
a stone's-throw away, my heart bleeds for those 
little weary feet struggling on and on, for those little 
fainting souls, moaning, grieving, trying to keep up, 
lying down at last to coax the blessed release of 
death, and I would like to stand here on the house- 
tops of Jerusalem and cry out against this insult to 
the memory of One who, when He said, " Suffer little 
children to come unto me," could hardly have foreseen 
that His words would bear such bitter fruit. 

I do not do it, however. I want to live to get 
home and print this thing, and have it graven on 
my tomb. 



XXXIII 



TWO HOLY MOUNTAINS 

WE set out early next morning for Mount Moriah, 
the site of Solomon's temple and those that 
followed it. 

It was really David's temple in the beginning, 
undertaken to avert a pestilence which he had selected 
from three punishments offered by the Lord because 
he, David, had presumed to number his people. A 
Hebrew census was a sin in those days, it would 
seem, and seventy thousand of the enrolled had al- 
ready died when David saw an angel with a drawn 
sword — the usual armament of an angel — standing 
by the threshing-floor of Oman the Jebusite. Through 
Gad, his Soothsayer, David was commanded to set 
up an altar on that spot, to avert further calamity. 
Negotiations with Oman were at once begun, to the 
end that Oman parted with the site for "six hundred 
shekels of gold, by weight"; the threshing-floor was 
quickly replaced by an altar, and here, on the top of 
Mount Moriah — on the great bowlder reputed to have 
been the sacrificial stone of Melchizedek — and of 
Abraham, who was said to have proffered Isaac here 
— King David made offering to the Lord, and was 
answered by fire from heaven on the newly erected 
altar. And the angel "put up his sword again into 
the sheath thereof." 

288 



Two Holy Mountains 



From that day the bowlder on the top of Mount 
Moriah became the place of sacrifice — the great cen- 
tral shrine of the Jewish faith. David decided to 
build a temple there, and prepared for it abundantly, 
as became his high purpose. But because David 
had shed much blood, the Lord interfered and com- 
manded him to turn the enterprise over to Solomon, 
"a man of rest." "He shall build an house for my 
name; and he shall be my son, and I will be his 
father ; and I will establish the throne of his kingdom 
over Israel forever." 

In the light of thoughtful Bible reading, it is not 
easy to see that Solomon was much of an improve- 
ment over David, in the long-run, and one cannot 
but notice the fact that the promise to establish his 
throne over Israel forever was not long maintained. 
But perhaps the Lord did not foresee how Solomon 
was going to turn out; besides, forever is a long 
time, and the Kingdom of Solomon may still prevail. 

Solomon completed the temple in a manner that 
made it celebrated, even to this day. The "oracle, 
or holy room, which held the Ark of the Covenant, 
was overlaid within with pure gold," and the rest of 
the temple was in keeping with this dazzling chamber. 

The temple was often pillaged during the troublous 
times that followed Solomon's reign, but it managed 
to stand till Nebuchadnezzar's conquest, four cen- 
turies later. It was twice rebuilt, the last time by 
Herod, on a scale of surpassing splendor. It was 
Herod's temple that Christ knew, and the work of 
beautifying and adding to it was going on during his 
entire lifetime. It was finished in 65 A.D., and five 

289 



The Ship -Dwellers 



years later it went down in the general destruction, 
though Titus himself tried to preserve it. 

Most of what exists to-day are the remains of 
Herod's temple. The vast court, or temple area, 
occupies about one-sixth of all Jerusalem, and of the 
genuineness of this site there is no question. In the 
centre of it, where once the house of David and 
Solomon stood, stands the Dome of the Rock — also 
called the Mosque of Omar, though it is not really 
a mosque, and was not built by Omar. It is, in fact, 
a marvellous jewelled casket — the most beautiful 
piece of architecture in the world, it has been called 
— built for no other purpose than to hold the old 
sacrificial stone of Melchizedek and Abraham — a land- 
mark revered alike by Moslem, Christian, and Jew. 

One is bound to feel impressed in the presence of 
that old bowlder, seamed and scarred by ages of sun 
and tempest ; hacked for this purpose and that ; gray 
with antiquity — the very corner-stone of three relig- 
ions, upholding the traditions and the faith of four 
thousand years. There is nothing sham or tawdry 
about that. The building is splendid enough, but it 
is artistically beautiful, and the old rock itself — the 
genuine rock of ages — is as bare and rugged as when 
Isaac lay upon it bound, and the "chosen people" 
narrowly missed non-existence. 

There is a railing around it ; but you can look over 
or through as long as you like, and if one is of a re- 
flective temperament he can look a long time. Among 
other things he will notice a number of small square 
holes, cut long ago to receive the ends of slender sup- 
ports that upheld a royal canopy or screen, and he 

290 



Two Holy Mountains 



will see the conduits cut to carry off the blood of the 
sacrifice. To his mental vision these things will con- 
jure pictures — a panorama of rites and ceremonials — 
of altar and incense, with all the splendid costume 
and blazonry of the Judean king. And, after these, 
sacrifices of another sort — the cry of battle and the 
clash of arms across this hoary relic, its conduits 
filled with a crimson tide that flowed without regard 
to ritual or priest. 

Other pictures follow: the feast of the Passover, 
when Jerusalem was crowded with strangers, when 
the great outer court of the temple was filled with 
booths and pens of the sellers who offered sheep, 
goats, cattle, and even doves for the sacrifice; when 
the temple itself was crowded with throngs of eager 
worshippers who brought their sacrifices, with tithes 
to the priests, and were made clean. 

Amid one such throng there is a boy of twelve 
years, who with His parents has come up to Jerusalem 
''after the custom of the feast." We think of them 
as quiet, simple people, those three from Nazareth, 
jostled by the crowds a good deal, and looking rather 
wonderingly on the curious sights of that great yearly 
event. They would work their way into the temple, 
by-and-by, and they would come here to the Rock, 
and perhaps the sad, deep-seeing eyes of that boy 
of twelve would look down the years to a day when 
in this same city it would be His blood that would 
flow at the hands of men. 

I hope He did not see that far. But we know that 
light for Him lay somewhat on the path ahead, for 
when the feast was over, and His parents had set out 

291 



The Ship -Dwellers 



for Nazareth, He lingered to mingle with the learned 
men, and He said to His parents when they came for 
Him, "Wist ye not that I must be about my father's 
business ?" Among all those who thronged about this 
stone for a thousand years, somehow the gentle 
presence of that boy of twelve alone remains, un van- 
ishing and clear. 

And what a mass of legends have heaped them- 
selves upon this old landmark! — a groundwork of 
Jewish tradition — a layer of Christian imagery — an 
ever-thickening crust of Moslem whim and fantasy. 
A few of them are perhaps worth repeating. The 
Talmud, for instance, is authority for the belief that 
the Rock covers the mouth of an abyss wherein the 
waters of the Flood may be heard roaring. Another 
belief of the Jews held it as the centre and one of 
the foundations of the world. Of Jesus it is said 
that He discovered upon the Rock the great and 
unspeakable name of God (Shem), and was thereby 
enabled to work his miracles. 

But the Moslem soars into fairy-land when he 
comes in the neighborhood of this ancient relic. To 
him the Rock hangs suspended in mid-air, and would 
have followed Mohammed to heaven if the Angel 
Gabriel had not held fast to it. We saw the prints 
of Gabriel's fingers, which were about the size and 
formation of a two-inch auger. Another Moslem 
fancy is that the rock rests on a palm watered by a 
river of Paradise. 

In the hollow beneath the Rock (probably an arti- 
ficial grotto) there is believed to be a well, the Well 
of Souls, where spirits of the deceased assemble twice 

292 



Two Holy Mountains 



a week to pray. They regard it as also the mouth of 
hell, which I don't think can be true, or the souls 
would not come there — not if they could help it — not 
as often as twice a week, I mean. 

A print of Mohammed's head is also shown in the 
roof of the grotto, and I believe in that, because, 
being a tall man, when I raised up suddenly I made 
another just like it. But I am descending into 
trivialities, and the Rock is not trivial by any means. 
It has been there since the beginning, and it is likely 
to remain there until all religions are forgotten, and 
the world is dead, and all the stars are dark. 

In front of the Dome of the Rock the sun was 
bright, and looking across the approach one gets a 
characteristic view of Jerusalem — its bubble-roofed 
houses and domes, its cypress and olive trees. I made 
a photograph of Laura, age fourteen, and a friend of 
hers, against that background, but they would have 
looked more "in the picture" in Syrian dress. I am 
not sure, however; some of our party have had them- 
selves photographed in Syrian dress, which seemed to 
belong to most of them about as much as a baseball 
uniform might belong to a Bedouin — or a camel. 

We crossed over to the ancient mosque El-Aksa, 
also within the temple area, but it was only mildly 
interesting after the Dome of the Rock. Still, there 
were things worth noting. There were the two pil- 
lars, for instance, which stand so close together that 
only slender people could squeeze between them. 
Yet in an earlier time every pilgrim had to try, and 
those who succeeded were certain of Paradise. This 

293 



The Ship -Dwellers 



made it humiliating for the others, and the impulse 
to train down for the test became so prevalent that 
stanchions were placed between the pillars a few 
years ago. We could only estimate our chances and 
give ourselves the benefit of the doubt. 

Then there is the Well of the Leaf, which has a pretty 
story. It is a cistern under the mosque, and the 
water is very clear. Once, during the caliphate of 
Omar, a sheik came to this well for water, and his 
bucket slipped from his hands. He went down after 
it, and came to a mysterious door which, when he 
opened it, led into a beautiful garden. Enchanted, 
he lingered there and finally plucked a leaf to bring 
back as a token of what he had seen. The leaf never 
withered, and so a prophecy of Mohammed's that one 
of his followers should enter Paradise alive had been 
fulfilled. 

I said I would go down and hunt for the door. But 
they said, "No" — that a good many had tried it 
without success. The cistern used to collect every 
year the pilgrims who went down to find that door; 
no one was permitted to try, now. 

In one of the windows of the old mosque we saw a 
curious sight: a very aged and very black, withered 
man — Bedouin, I should say — reclining face down 
in the wide sill, poring over an ancient parch- 
ment book, patiently transcribing from it cabalistic 
passages on a black, charred board with a sharpened 
stick. The guide said he was a magician from some- 
where in the dim interior; certainly he looked it. 

From somewhere — it was probably from an open- 
ing in the wall near the Golden Gate — we looked east- 

294 



Two Holy Mountains 



ward across the valley of Kedron toward the fair 
hillsides, which presently we were to visit. 

Immediately we set out for the Mount of Olives. 
We drove, and perhaps no party ever ascended that 
sacred hill on a fairer morning. The air was still, and 
there was a quiet Sunday feeling in the sunshine. In 
the distance there was a filmy, dreamy haze that gave 
just the touch of ideality to the picture. 

The road that leads up Olivet is bordered by tra- 
ditional landmarks, but we could not stop for them. 
It was enough to be on the road itself, following the 
dusty way the Son of Man and His disciples once 
knew so well. For this hill of fair olive-groves, over- 
looking Jerusalem, was their favorite resort, and it 
was their habit to come here to look down in con- 
templation on the holy city. It was here that the 
Master felt the shadow of coming events : the destruc- 
tion of the city ; the persecution and triumph of His 
followers ; His own approaching tragedy. It was . 
here that He gave them the parable of the Virgins, 
and of the Talents, and it was here that He came 
often at evening for rest and prayer, after the buffet 
and labor of the day. This is the road His feet so 
often trod — a well-kept road, with the olive-groves, 
now as then, sloping away on either side. 

Here and there we turned to look down on Jeru- 
salem, lying there bathed in the sunlit haze — a toy 
city, it seemed, with its little round-topped houses, 
its domes and minarets, its battlemented walls. How 
very small it was, indeed! Why, one could run its 
entire circuit without losing breath. It is, in fact, 
little more than half a mile across in any direction, 

295 



The Ship -Dwellers 



and from a distance it becomes an exquisite jewel set 
amid barren hills. 

I am afraid I did not properly enjoy the summit 
of the Mount of Olives — its landmarks, I mean. The 
Russian and Greek and Latin churches have spoiled 
it with offensive architecture, and they have located 
and labelled exact sites in a way that destroys the 
reality of the events. They have framed in the 
precise spot where Jesus stood at the time of His 
ascension. It is a mistake to leave it there. It 
should be transferred to the Church of the Holy 
Sepulchre. 

But the view eastward, looking down on the Jor- 
dan and the Dead Sea, with the mountains of Moab 
lying beyond, they cannot spoil or change. Down 
there on that spot, thirty-five hundred years ago, 
the chosen people camped and prepared for the rav- 
age and conquest of this valley, this mountain, and 
the fair lands beyond, even to Mount Hermon and 
the westward sea. Over there, on " Nebo's lonely 
mountain," Moses looked down upon this land of vine 
and olive which he was never to enter, and being 
weary with the harassings of his stiff-necked people, 
lay down by the wayside and left them to work out 
their own turbulent future. 

"And the angels of God upturned the sod 
And laid the dead man there." 

I have always loved those lines, and it was worth 
the voyage to remember them here, looking down 
from the Mount of Olives toward the spot where 
lies that unknown grave. 

296 



XXXIV 



THE LITTLE TOWN OF THE MANGER 

IT was afternoon when we drove to Bethlehem — a 
pleasant drive, though dusty withal. The road lies 
between grain-fields — fields where Ruth may have 
gleaned, and where the Son of Man may have stopped 
to gather corn. It gives one a curious feeling to re- 
member that these fields are the same, and that for 
them through all the centuries seed-time and harvest 
have never failed. Nor have they changed — the 
walls, the laborers, the methods, the crops belong to 
any period that this country has known. 

The convent of Elijah was pointed out to us, but 
it did not matter. Elijah never saw it — never heard 
of it. It is different, however, with a stone across 
the way from the entrance. Elijah went to sleep on 
that stone, and slept so heavily that he left his im- 
print there, which remains to this day. We viewed 
that stone with interest; then we took most of it 
and went on. 

In a little while we came to the tomb of Rachel. 
The small, mosque-like building that covers it is not 
very old, but the site is probably as well authenticated 
as any of that period. Jacob was on his way from 
Padan when she died, and he buried her by the 
roadside "when there was but a little way to come 
into Ephrath" (which is Bethlehem). He marked the 

297 



The Ship -Dwellers 



grave with a pillar which the generations would not 
fail to point out, one to another, as the last resting- 
place of this mother in Israel who died that Benjamin 
might have life. 

Poor Rachel! Supplanted in her husband's love; 
denied long the natural heritage of woman; paying 
the supreme price at last, only to be left here by 
the wayside alone, outside the family tomb. All the 
others are gathered at Hebron in the Field of Mach- 
pelah, which Abraham bought from the children of 
Heth for Sarah's burial-place. Jacob, at the very 
last, made his sons swear that they would bury him 
at Hebron with the others. He remembered Rachel 
in her lonely grave, and spoke of her there, but did 
not ask that he be taken to lie by her side, or that 
she be laid with the others. He died as he had lived 
— self-seeking, unsympathetic — a commonplace old 
man. 

Just outside of Bethlehem we were welcomed by a 
crowd of little baksheesh girls, of a better look and 
distinctly of a better way than the Jerusalem type. 
They ran along with the carriage and began a chant 
which, behold, was German, at least Germanesque: 

"Oh, du Froliche! 
Oh, du Heilege! 

B aksheesh ! B aksheesh ! ' ' 

I suppose "Oh, thou happy one; Oh, thou holy 
one," would be about the translation, with the wail- 
ing refrain at the end. I think we gave them some- 
thing. I hope so; they are after us always, and we 
either give them or we don't, without much discrimi- 

298 



The Little Town of the Manger 



nation. You can't discriminate. They are all wretched 
and miserably needy. You give to get rid of them, 
or when pity clutches a little fiercer than usual at 
your heart. 

So we were at the gates of Bethlehem — the little 
town whose name is familiar at the firesides of more 
than half the world — a name that always brings with 
it a feeling of bright stars and dim fields: 

" Where shepherds watched their flocks by night 
All seated on the ground," 

and of angel voices singing peace and goodwill. A 
camel-train led the way through the gates. 

I suppose the city itself is not unlike Jerusalem in 
its general character, only somewhat cleaner, and less 
extensive. We went immediately to the place of the 
nativity, but before we could get to it we were seized 
and dragged and almost compelled to buy some of 
the mother-of-pearl beads and fancy things that are 
made just across the way. We escaped into the 
Church of the Nativity at last — an old, old church, 
desolate and neglected in its aspect, though sufficient- 
ly occupied with chanting and droning and candle- 
bearing acolytes. Yet it is better — oh, much better — 
than the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and it has a 
legitimate excuse. If Christ was born in a Bethle- 
hem manger, as the gospel records, it is probable that 
He was born here. There are many reasons for be- 
lieving that the grotto below this church was used 
as the inn stables in that time, and that the brief life 
which has laid its tender loveliness on so many lives 
had its beginning here. 

299 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We descended to the grotto and stood on the spot 
that is said to have heard His first infant cry. There 
is a silver star in the floor polished with kisses, and 
there are a lot of ornate lamps and other paltry 
things hanging about. It does not matter, I suppose, 
but I wish these professional religionists did not find 
such things necessary to stimulate their faith. Still, 
one could shut his eyes and realize, or try to realize, 
that he was standing in the place where the Light 
that has illumined a world struck its first feeble 
spark; where the impulse that for nineteen hundred 
years has swept across the nations in tides of war 
and peace first trembled into life — a wave of love in 
a mother's heart. As I say, the rest did not matter. 

While the others were looking into the shops across 
the way, I wandered about the streets a little, the side 
streets, which in character cannot have changed much 
in nineteen hundred years. The people are poor, and 
there are many idlers. There are beggars, too; some 
of them very wretched — and leprous, I think. It 
seems a pity, here in the birthplace of Him who 
healed with a word. 

We bought some of the Bethlehem beads. They 
will sell you a string a yard long for a franc, and they 
cut each bead separately from mother-of-pearl with 
the most primitive tools, and they shape it and polish 
it and bore a hole in it, all by hand, and link it on 
a gimp wire. In America you could not get a single 
bead made in that way for le'ss than double what they 
ask for a whole string. But, as I have said, they are 
very poor here — as poor as when they bestowed a 
Saviour on mankind. 

300 



XXXV 



THE SORROW OF THE CHOSEN — THE WAY OF THE CROSS 

\X / E had left Bethlehem and were back in Jerusa- 



V V lem, presently, on our way to the Jews' Wailing- 
place. I did not believe in it before I went. I was 
afraid it might be a sort of show-place, prepared for 
the occasion. I have changed my mind now. If 
there is one thing in Jerusalem absolutely genuine 
and directly linked with its ancient glories, it is the 
Jews' Wai ling-place. 

You approach it through a narrow lane — a sicken- 
ing gantlet of misery. Near the entrance wretched 
crones, with the distaff and spindle of the Fates, sat 
in the dust, spinning what might have been the 
thread of sorrow. iVlong the way the beggars ; not 
the ordinary vociferous beggars of Constantinople, 
of Smyrna, of Ephesus, even of Jaffa, but beggars 
such as the holy city alone can duplicate. Men and 
women who are only the veriest shreds of humanity, 
crouched in the dirt, reeking with filth and rags and 
vermin and sores, staring with blind and festering 
eyes, mumbling, moaning, and wailing out their eter- 
nal cry of baksheesh, often — if a woman — clutching 
some ghastly infant to a bare, scrawny breast. There 
was no loud demand for alms ; it was only a muted 
chorus of pleading, the voice with which misery spells 
its last word. Some made no sound, nor gesture, even. 
20 301 




The Ship -Dwellers 



They saw nothing, heard nothing, knew nothing — 
they were no longer alive — they had only not ceased 
to breathe and suffer. The spectacle made us gasp 
and want to cry out with the very horror of it. 

We were through the fearful gantlet at last, and 
went directly into the Jews' Wailing-place. There 
behold the most lamentable passage in the most 
tragic epic of all history — the frayed remnant of a 
once mighty race mourning for its fall. A few hours 
before, and but a few rods away, we had looked upon 
the evidences of its former greatness, its splendor and 
its glory — the place of King Solomon's temple when 
it sat as on the pinnacle of the world. Indeed, we 
were looking at it now, for this wall before which they 
bow in anguish is a portion of the mighty architecture 
for which they mourn. In the general destruction of 
Titus this imposing fragment remained, and to-day 
they bow before it and utter their sorrow in the most 
doleful grieving that ever fell on human ear. Along 
the wall they stand or kneel, and on rows of benches 
behind they gather thickly, reading from faded and 
tattered Hebrew Scriptures the "Lamentations," or 
chanting in chorus the saddest dirge the world has 
ever known. 

" Because of the palace which is deserted — 
We sit alone and weep. 
Because of the temple which is destroyed, 
Because of the walls which are broken down, 
Because of our greatness which has departed, 
Because of the precious stones of the temple ground to 
powder, 

Because of our priests who have erred and gone astray, 
Because of our kings who have contemned God — 
We sit alone and weep ! ' ' 

302 



THE DEPTH OF THEIR FALL 



The Sorrow of the Chosen — The Way of the Cross 



It is no mere ceremony — no mock sorrow ; it is the 
mingled wail of a fallen people. These Jews know as 
no others of their race can realize the depth of their 
fall, and they gather here to give it voice — a 
tonal and visual embodiment of despair. Even I, 
who am not of that race, felt all at once the deadly 
clutch of that vast grieving, and knew something 
of what a young Hebrew, a member of our party, 
felt when he turned sick and hurried from the 
spot. 

What other race has maintained an integrity of 
sorrow? What, for instance, does the blood of Im- 
perial Rome care for its departed grandeur ? It does 
not even recognize itself. What other nation has 
ever maintained racial integrity of any kind? But, 
then, these were a chosen people! 

Chosen, why ? Because they were a noble people ? 
Hardly. Their own chronicles record them as a 
murmuring, rebellious, unstable race. Following the 
history of the chosen people from Jacob to Joshua, 
one is in a constant state of wonder at the divine 
selection. We may admit that God loved them, but 
we seek in vain for an excuse. In His last talk with 
Moses He declared that they would forsake Him, and 
that He in turn would forsake them and hide His face 
because of the evils they should do. 

Moses, who knew them even better, distrusted them 
even more. "For I know that after my death ye 
will utterly corrupt yourselves," he said, almost with 
his latest breath. He told them that curses would 
befall them, and gave them a few sample curses, any 
one of which would lift the bark off of a tree. No 

3°3 



The Ship -Dwellers 



wonder he was willing to lie down in Mount Nebo 
and be at peace. 

Yet they are a chosen people — a people apart — a 
race that remains a race, and does not perish. Chosen 
for what ? To make a bitter example of what a race 
can do when it remains a race — how high it can rise 
and how low may become its estate of misery ? Re- 
member, I am not considering the Jew as an individ- 
ual; he is often noble as an individual; and it was 
a Jew who brought light into the world. I am con- 
sidering a race — a race no worse than any other, and 
no better, but a chosen race; a race that without a 
ruler, without a nation, without a government — that 
outcast and despised of many nations has yet re- 
mained a unit through three thousand years. I am 
maintaining that only a chosen people could do 
that, and, without being able even to surmise the 
purpose, it is my humble opinion that the ages will 
show that purpose to have been good. 

I have already inferred that the landmarks and 
localities of Jerusalem may be viewed with interest, 
but not too seriously. They have all associations, 
but most of them not the particular and sacred asso- 
ciations with which they are supposed to be identified. 
The majority of them were not located until Christ 
had been dead for a thousand years, and the means 
of locating them does not invite conviction. In- 
spiration located most of them, dreams the rest. 
That is to say, imagination. Whenever a priest or a 
dignitary wanted to distinguish himself he discovered 
something. He first made up his mind what he 

3°4 




Copyright, by Underwood & Underwood. 

the way of the cross 
(holy week) 



The Sorrow of the Chosen — The Way of the Cross 



would like to discover, and then had an inspiration 
or a dream, and the thing was done. The eight 
Stations of the Cross, for instance, were never men- 
tioned earlier than the twelfth century, and the Via 
Dolorosa, the Way of the Cross, was not so known 
until the fourteenth. Still, it must have been along 
some such street that the Man of Sorrow passed 
between the Garden and the Cross. 

We visited the Garden first. It was now late in 
the afternoon, and the sunlight had become tender 
and still and dream-like, and as we passed the tra- 
ditional places — the house of Pilate, under the Ecce 
Homo arch, and the others, we had the feeling that 
it might have been on an evening like this that the 
Son of Man left the city, and with His disciples went 
down to Gethsemane to pray. 

We were a very small party now — there were only 
four of us and the guide, for the others had become 
tired and were willing to let other things go. But if 
we were tired, we did not know it, and I shall always 
be glad of that fact. 

At St. Stephen's gate (the tradition is that he was 
stoned there) we stopped to look down on Gethsem- 
ane. Perhaps it is not the real site, and perhaps the 
curious gilt-turreted church is not beautiful, but set 
there on the hillside amid the cypresses and ven- 
erable olive-trees, all aglow and agleam with the sun- 
set, with the shadow of the dome of Omar creeping 
down upon it, there was about it a beauty of un- 
reality that was positively supernatural. I was al- 
most tempted not to go down there for fear of spoil- 
ing the illusion. 

305 



The Ship -Dwellers 



We went, however, and the gnarled olive - trees, 
some of which are said to have been there at the time 
of Christ — and look it — were worth while. The gar- 
den as a whole, however, was less interesting than 
from above, and it was only the feeling that some- 
where near here the Man who would die on Calvary 
asked that the cup of sorrow might pass from Him 
which made us linger. 

It was verging on twilight when we climbed to the 
city, and the others were for going to the hotel. But 
there was one more place I wanted to see. That was 
the hill outside of Jerusalem which the guide-books 
rather charily mention as ''Gordon's Calvary," be- 
cause General Gordon once visited it and accepted 
it as the true place of the Crucifixion. I knew that 
other thoughtful men had accepted it, too, and had 
favored a tomb not far away called the "Garden 
Tomb" as the true Sepulchre. I wanted to see 
these things and judge for myself. But two of our 
party and the guide spoke no English, and my 
Biblical German needed practice. There seemed to 
be no German word for Calvary, and when I ventured 
into details I floundered. Still, I must have struck a 
spark somewhere, for presently a light illumined our 
guide's face: 

"Golgota! Das richtige Golgota" (the true Gol- 
gotha), he said, excitedly, and then I remembered 
that I should have said Golgotha, the "Place of the 
Skull," in the beginning. 

We were away immediately, all of us, hurrying for 
the Damascus gate, beyond which it lay. It was not 
far — nothing is far in Jerusalem — and presently we 

306 



The Sorrow of the Chosen — The Way of the Cross 



were outside, at the wicket of a tiny garden — a sweet, 
orderly little place — where a pleasant German woman 
and a tall old Englishman with a spiritual face were 
letting us in. Then they led us to a little arbor, and 
directly — to a tomb, a real tomb, cut into the cliff over- 
hanging the garden. 

I do not know whether Jesus was laid in that tomb 
or not, and it is not likely that any one will ever 
know. But He could have been laid there, and it is 
not unlikely that He was laid there, for Golgotha — the 
hill that every unprejudiced visitor immediately ac- 
cepts as the true Golgotha — overlooks this garden. 

We could not ascend the hill — the Mohammedans 
no longer permit that — but we could go to the end 
of the garden and look up to the little heap of stones 
which marks the old place of stoning and of cruci- 
fixion. It was always the place of public execution. 
The Talmud refers to it, and the Jews of Jerusalem 
spit toward it to this day. We could make out the 
contour of the skull which gave it its name, and even 
the face, for in its rocky side ancient tombs and clefts 
formed the clearly distinguished features. 

It is a hill; it is outside the walls; it is the tradi- 
tional site of executions; it is the one natural place 
to which Jesus would have been taken for crucifixion. 
The Calvary in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre was 
never a hill; it was never outside the walls; it was 
never a traditional site for anything until Queen He- 
lena began to dream. 

Perhaps the reader may say, "With all the tales 
and traditions and disputes and doubts, what does it 
matter?" Perhaps it does not matter. Perhaps that 

307 



The Ship -Dwellers 



old question of Pilate, "What is truth?" need not be 
answered. 

Yet somewhere amid the mass of confliction there 
follows a thread of fact. Sifting the testimony, it is 
difficult to deny that there once lived a man named 
Jesus — later, and perhaps then — known as the Christ ; 
that He was of humble birth, and grew up to teach a 
doctrine of forgiveness and humility (a doctrine new 
to the Hebrew teachers of His day, whose religion 
consisted mainly of ceremonial forms) ; that He was 
able to heal the sick; that He had a following who, 
perhaps, hailed Him as their king; that it was be- 
cause of these things that He was crucified on a hill 
outside of Jerusalem. 

I think this is as far as general acknowledgment 
goes. The Scriptures declare more, the sceptic allows 
less ; but the majority of mankind unite on the fore- 
going admissions. At all events, a great religion was 
founded on this man's life and death — a doctrine of 
gentleness when creeds are stripped away — and it is 
proper that such truth as can be established concern- 
ing the ground He trod, especially on that last dark 
day, should be recognized and made known. Of our 
little party of four there was not one who — standing 
there as the stars came out, and looking up at that 
hill outlined against the sky — did not feel a full and 
immediate conviction that this was indeed the spot 
where that last, supreme expiation was made, and 
that this sweet garden, guarded by these two gentle 
people, was the truer site for the Sepulchre which was 
"nigh at hand." 



XXXVI 



AT THE MOUTH OF THE NILE 

I AM not a gifted person; I cannot write about 
existing places and things without seeing them, 
and I am afraid to steal from the guide-book — 
unintelligent ly, I mean. I have sometimes found the 
guid -book mistaken — not often, I admit, but too 
often to take phances. I should be struck with 
remorse if I should steal from the guide-book and 
then find that I had stolen a mistake. So I shall 
have to skip Galilee, Tiberias, Nazareth, and Hebron, 
for the reason that I could not visit those and include 
Egypt, too, by our schedule. 

One must go to Egypt. If the "grand object of all 
travel is to visit the shores of the Mediterranean," 
then the grand climax of that tour is Egypt. One 
must take all the time there is for that amazing land, 
and any time will be too short, even though it be a 
lifetime. 

The guide-book says that the arrival at Alexandria 
is not very impressive. I suppose a good deal depends 
on the day and the time of day and one's mental 
attitude. As usual with our arrivals, it was early 
morning, and everything was hazy and yellow-misty 
with sunrise. We were moving slowly, and the water 
was glassy still. Here and there across the yellow 
haze drifted a barge-like craft with a lateen-sail, or 

309 



The Ship -Dwellers 



a slow moving boat, pulled by men in native dress. 
Then out of the mist across the port bow came the 
outline of a low-lying shore, and a shaft that rose, a 
vague pencil against the morning glow. The Diplo- 
mat was leaning on the rail at my side. 

"Egypt," he said, quietly. "That is a lighthouse 
— they call it a pharos, after the one that Ptolemy 
built ; it must have stood about in the same direction." 

Certainly that was not very dramatic, not actively 
so at least, but to me it was impressive; and stealing 
into that dream-like harbor, through the mellow quiet 
of the morning, I had the feeling that we were creeping 
up on the past — catching it asleep, as it were; that 
this was indeed the pharos of the Ptolemies — the 
harbor they had known. 

I shall always remember Alexandria, Egypt. I 
shall always remember the railway station with its 
wild hallabaloo of Arab porters, who grab one's hand- 
baggage, make off with it, and sit on it in a secluded 
place until you race around and hunt it up and 
produce baksheesh for its return. You do not check 
baggage in Egypt, by the way; you register it, which 
means that you tell somebody about it, then try to 
convince yourself that it is all right and that some 
day you will see it again. 

But I shall remember that station for another 
reason. When we had finally fought our way through 
to the train, and Laura and I had placed our things 
here and there in our compartment — in the racks and 
about — we realized that we were hot and thirsty, 
and I said I would slip back and get some oranges, 
seeing we had plenty of time. 

310 



At the Mouth of the Nile 



It was easy to do that — easy enough, I mean, for 
I no longer had anything for the Bedouins to grab. 
I got the oranges and paid a piastre apiece for 
them — about ten times what they were worth in 
Jaffa, and I had the usual difficulty making change 
— a detachment of interested Arabs looking on 
meanwhile. Then I started back, and was stopped 
by a guard who wanted to see my ticket. I felt for 
the flat leather case which I generally carry in my 
hip-pocket. It was gone! 

If there had been anything resembling a chair 
there I should have sat down. As it was I took hold 
of the little railing, for my knees had a watery feeling 
which I felt was not to be trusted. That pocket-book 
contained my letter of credit; all my money, except 
a little change; my tickets, my character — everything 
that an unprotected stranger is likely to need in a 
strange land! When I got my breath I dived into 
all my pockets at once, then went through them 
categorically, as much as three times apiece. I had 
never realized I owned so many pockets or that they 
could be so empty, so useless. 

Those Bedouins had done it, of course. I rushed 
back to the orange-man, and in a mixture of three 
languages which nobody, not even myself, could 
understand, explained my loss. He shrugged his 
shoulders in French, elevated his hands in Egyptian, 
and said "No can tell" in English. I glared around 
at the contiguous Bedouins, but they all looked dis- 
interestedly guilty. In a mixed daze I went back 
to the guard, and crept through when he was attend- 
ing to another passenger. I still held the bag of 

311 



The Ship -Dwellers 



oranges, and handed them to Laura, who was quietly 
waiting, looking out the window at the passing show. 
Little did she guess my condition, and how could I 
tell her? 

It was quite by chance that I glanced up at the 
overhead rack where I had stowed our smaller 
packages. Ah me! The gates of bliss open wide 
will never be a more inspiring sight than what I 
saw there. There it lay — that precious pocket-book! 
In the disordered mental state of our arrival I had 
for some unguessed reason taken out my pocket-case 
and laid it there with the other items. It was safe — 
safe in every detail. The world suddenly became 
glorified. Those Bedouins were my brothers. I 
would have gone back and embraced them if the train 
had not begun to move. 

Yes, I shall always remember Alexandria. 

There is a continuous panorama between Alex- 
andria and Cairo, absolutely fascinating to one who 
has not seen it before, and I wonder how it can ever 
grow old to any one. Almost immediately there was 
water — the Nile, or one of its canals — and stretch- 
ing away, a dead level of green — lavish, luxurious, 
blossoming green — the delta-land of Lower Egypt, 
the richest garden in all the world. A network of 
irrigation; mud villages that might have been made 
by wasps; a low -dropping sky that met the level 
green — these made a background, and against it, 
along the raised road that follows the Nile, an endless 
procession passed. 

A man riding a camel, leading another; a boy 
watering two buffaloes; an Arab walking, followed 

312 



At the Mouth of the Nile 



by his wife and a string of loaded donkeys; ditto 
camels; a cow grinding an old Egyptian water-mill 
that has been in use since Pharaoh's time ; two men 
turning an Archimedes screw to lift the water to 
their fields — so the pictures whirl by. The Orient 
has become familiar to us, yet for some reason the 
atmosphere, the impression, is wholly different here, 
because — I cannot tell why — because this is Egypt, I 
suppose, and there is only one Egypt, a fact easier to 
realize than to explain. 

The day was well along when we reached Cairo 
and, after the usual battle with the Ishmaelites, drove 
to Shepheard's Hotel. As there is only one Egypt, 
so there is only one Shepheard's Hotel. There are 
other hotels as large and as lavish, with as fair gardens, 
perhaps, but I believe there is no other hotel on the 
planet where you can sit on a vast balmy terrace 
and look down on such a panorama of the nations — 
American, European, Asiatic, African — such a uni- 
versal congress of pleasure as each winter assembles 
here. It would take a more riotous pen than mine to 
achieve a description of that mixture. If the reader 
can imagine a World's Fair Midway of every nation- 
ality and every costume and every language and mode 
of locomotion under the sun, and can see mingled 
with it all the dark-faced sellers of shawls and scarabs, 
and beads and relics, the picture will serve, and we 
will let it go at that. 

And perhaps I may as well say here that Cairo is 
the wildest, freest place in Christendom. The con- 
fluence of Upper and Lower Egypt — the Delta and 
the Nile — here on the edge of the desert, it is the 

313 



The Ship-Dwellers 



veritable jumping-off place where all conventions 
melt away. It is the neutral ground where East and 
West meet — each to adopt the special privilege and 
license of the other — madly to compete in lavishness 
of dress and the reckless joy of living. In the language 
of the Reprobates, ''One gets his money's worth in 
Cairo, if he makes his headquarters at Shepheard's 
and sits in the game." But he will require a certain 
capital to make good his ante. If I hadn't found that 
pocket-book at Alexandria I should have taken my 
meals with the Arabs in the back basement. 

The Arab, by- the- way, is the general servitor in 
the Egyptian hotel. You ring three times when you 
want him, and he is as picturesque and gentle a 
Bedouin as ever held up a camel train or slew a 
Christian to glorify his faith. He is naive and noise- 
less, and whatever you ask him for he says "Yes," 
and if you ask him if he understands he says "Yes," 
and you will never know whether he does or not until 
you see what he brings. It does not help matters 
to talk loudly to the Arab. Volume of sound does 
not increase his lingual gifts, and spelling the article 
is likewise wasted effort. Ladies sometimes try that 
method. The trunk of one of our party had not 
reached her room — and she needed it. 

"My trunk," she said to the Arab. "You know, 
trunk — t-r-u-n-k, trunk — yes, trunk, with my name 
on it — you know — n-a-m-e — my initials, I mean, you 
know— T. D.— T. D. on both ends." 

The Arab did know "trunk"; the rest was mere 
embroidery. 



XXXVII 



THE SMILE OF THE SPHINX 

THERE was not much left of the afternoon when 
we reached Cairo, but some of us wandered off 
here and there to get the habit of the place, as it 
were. Laura and I came to a trolley-line present- 
ly, and found that it ran out to the Pyramids and 
Sphinx. We were rather shocked at the thought, 
but recovered and decided to steal a march on the 
others by slipping out there and having those old 
wonders all to ourselves, at sunset. 

It is a long way. You pass through streets of 
many kinds and by houses of many sorts, and you 
cross the Nile and glide down an avenue of palms 
where there are glimpses of water — the infinite desert 
stretching away into the evening. Long before we 
reached them we saw the outlines of the three pyra- 
mids against the sky, and then we made out the 
Sphinx — that old group which is perhaps the most 
familiar picture that children know. 

Yet, somehow, it could not be true that this was the 
reality of the pictures we had seen. The likeness 
was very great, certainly, but those pictures had 
represented something in a realm of books and 
romance — the unattainable land — while these were 
here; we were actually going to them, and in a 
trolley-car! It required all the spell of Egypt then 

3i5 



The Ship -Dwellers 



— the palms, the desert, and the evening sky — to fit 
the reality into its old place in the hall of dreams. 

We had thought to have a quiet view, but 
this was a miscalculation. There is no such thing 
as a quiet view of the Pyramids. At any hour of the 
day or night you are immediately beset by beggars 
and fortune - tellers and would - be guides, and you 
are pulled and dragged and distracted by their im- 
portunities until you have lost all interest in your 
original purpose in a general desire to start a plague 
or a massacre that will wipe out the whole pestiferous 
crew. There is no hope, except in the employment 
of one or two of the guides — the strongest-looking 
ones, who will in a certain measure keep off the 
others — and you will have to engage donkeys, and 
perhaps have your fortune told. Otherwise these 
creatures will follow you and surround you, insisting 
that they want no money; that they only love you; 
that it makes them happy even to be near you ; that 
they love all Americans; that, in short, for a shilling, 
just a shilling, and a baksheesh (a piastre), one little 
baksheesh, they will become your guide, your slave, 
the dirt under your feet — "Ah, mister — ze Sphinkis, 
ze Pyramid, aevry-zing!" It is a disgrace to Egypt, 
and to England who is in charge here now, that such 
persecution is permitted in the shadow of one of the 
world's most revered and imposing ruins. 

We engaged donkeys, at last, after there had been 
several fights over us, and set out up the road to the 
Great Pyramid, assailed every little way by bandits 
lying in wait. The Great Pyramid does not improve 
with close acquaintance. It has been too much 

316 



The Smile of the Sphinx 



damaged by time and criminal assault. It loses its 
clean-cut outlines as you come near and becomes 
little more than a stupendous heap of stones. I 
think we were a trifle disappointed with a close 
inspection, to tell the truth, for even the largest 
pictures do not give one quite the impression of 
the reality. It was as if we had been gazing at some 
marvellous painting, and then had walked up very 
near to see how the work was done. 

The charm came back as we rode off a little and 
turned to view it now and again in the evening light. 
The irregularities disappeared; the outlines became 
clean against the sky; I was no longer disappointed 
in that giant of architecture whose shadow (it lay 
now just at our feet) began marking time at a period 
when the world had no recorded history. 

Yet in one or two respects the reality differed from 
the dream. Usually stone grows gray with age and 
takes on moss and lichen — the mould of time. The 
Pyramids are entirely bare, and they are not gray. 
The stones might have been laid up yesterday so far 
as any vegetable increment is concerned, and their 
color is a tawny gold — luminous gold in the sunset, 
like the barren hills beyond. The daily sandblast 
of the desert will level these monuments in time, 
no doubt, but the last fragment in that remote age 
will still be bare and in color unchanged. 

As with the Pyramids, our first impression of the 
Sphinx was one of disappointment. It seemed 
small to us. It is small compared with a pyramid, 
while the photographs give one another idea. The 
photographs are made with the Sphinkis (Sphinx, 
21 317 



The Ship -Dwellers 



I mean — one falls so easily into the native speech) 
in the foreground, looking fully as big as the second- 
size pyramid and quite able to have the third-size 
pyramid for breakfast. Figures mean nothing in the 
face of a picture like that; you comprehend them, 
but you do not realize them — visualize them, perhaps 
I ought to say. 

So the Sphinx seemed small to us as we approached, 
and even when we were on the immediate brink of 
sand, gazing down upon it, its sixty -five feet of 
stature seemed reduced from the image in our 
minds. 

But the Sphinx grows on one. As the light faded 
and the shadows softened its scarred features there 
came also a dignity and with it a feeling of immensity, 
of grandeur, a vast indifference to all puny things. 
And then — perhaps it was the light, perhaps it was 
because I stood at a particular angle, but certainly — 
standing just there, at that moment, I saw, or 
fancied I saw, about its serene lips the suggestion or 
beginning of a smile. The more I looked, the more 
certain of it I became, and when I spoke of it to 
Laura, she saw it, too. Yes, undoubtedly we had 
caught the Sphinx smiling — not outwardly, at least 
not openly, but quietly, quizzically — smiling inside 
as one might say. I could not understand it then, 
but later it came to me. 

Back at the hotel, to-night, I thought it out. I 
remembered that the Sphinx had been there a long 
time; nobody knows how long, but a very long time 
indeed. I remembered that it had seen a number of 

3i8 



The Smile of the Sphinx 



things — a very great number of tilings. I remembered 
that it had seen one very curious thing, to wit : 

A long time ago, when a certain Pharaoh — we can 
only guess which Pharaoh — ruled over Egypt, it saw 
a younsr man who had been sold into bondage from 
Syria rise in the king's favor through certain dreams 
and become his chief counsellor, even "ruler over all 
the land of Egypt." It saw him in the height of his 
power and glory bring his family, who were Syrian 
shepherds, down from their barren hills and establish 
them in the favor of the Egyptian king. The Sphinx 
was old — a thousand years old, at least, even then — 
and, being wise, heard with certain curiosity their 
claim that they were a "chosen people," and thought- 
fully watched them multiply through a few brief 
centuries into a band of servitors who, because of 
this tradition, held themselves a race apart, repeating 
tales of a land of promise which they would some day 
inherit. Then at last, during a period of visitation, 
the Sphinx saw them escape, taking what they could 
lay their hands on, straggling away, with their families 
and their flocks, toward the Red Sea. The Sphinx 
heard nothing more of that tribe for about three 
thousand years. 

Then an amazing thing happened. Among those 
who came to wonder at the Sphinx's age and mystery 
were some who repeated tales of that runaway band 
— tales magnified and embroidered almost beyond 
recognition — and, what was more curious, accepted 
them — not as such tales are usually accepted, with a 
heavy basis of discount — but as gospel ; inspired truth ; 
the foundation of a mighty religion ; the word of God. 

319 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Nor was that all. The Sphinx realized presently 
that not only were those old stories accepted as 
gospel by the descendants of the race themselves, but 
by a considerable number of the human race at large 
— accepted and debated in a most serious manner, 
even to the point of bloodshed. 

Some details of this inspired chronology were 
wholly new to the Sphinx. It was interesting, for 
example, to hear that there had been three million 
of those people, and that before they started there 
had been a time when the Nile had been turned to 
blood — twice, in fact : once by the grace of God and 
once by magicians. The Sphinx did not remember 
a time when the Nile had turned to blood. In the 
five thousand years and more of its existence it had 
never heard of a magician who could produce that 
result. It was interesting, too, to learn that the Red 
Sea had opened a way for those people to cross, and 
that the hosts of Egypt, trying to follow them, had 
been swallowed up and drowned. This was wholly 
new. The Sphinx had been there and seen all that 
had happened, but she had somehow missed those 
things. 

Not that the Sphinx was surprised at these em- 
broideries. She had seen several mythologies cre- 
ated, and knew the general scale of enlargement and 
glorification. It was only when she saw strong, 
cultured, and enlightened nations still accepting the 
old Hebrew poem — with all its stately figures and 
exaggerations — as gospel ; heard them actually trying 
to prove that a multitude as big as the census of 
Australia had marched out with its chattels and its 

320 



The Smile of the Sphinx 



flocks ; heard them vow that the Red Sea had parted 
long enough to let this population pass through; 
heard them maintain that this vast assembly had 
found shade and refreshment on the other side by 
twelve wells of water and under seventy palm-trees: 
heard them tell how the sea behind them had suddenly 
rushed together and swallowed up all the Egyptian 
army (including the king himself, some said) — it was 
only when the Sphinx heard learned men argue these 
things as facts that a smile — scarcely perceptible, 
yet still a smile — began to grow behind the stone lips. 

That is the smile we saw to-night — a quiet smile, a 
gracious smile, a compassionate smile — and as it has 
grown so slowly, so it will not soon depart. For by-and- 
by, when these ages have passed, and with them their 
story and their gospels — when those old chronicles of 
the Jews have been relegated to the realm of mythol- 
ogy for a thousand years — there may come another 
band who will establish their traditions as God's holy 
word, and the Sphinx — still remaining, still observing, 
still looking across the encompassing sands to the 
sunrise — will smile, and dream old dreams. 



XXXVIII 



WAYS THAT ARE EGYPTIAN 

1 WONDER why we are always taken first to the 
mosques, or why, when our time is pretty limited, 
we are taken to them at all. Mosques are well 
enough, but when you have seen a pretty exhaustive 
line of them in Turkey and Syria, Egypt cannot 
furnish any very startling attractions in this field. 
For mosques are modern (anything less than a thou- 
sand years old is modern to us now), and Egypt 
is not a land of modern things. Besides, here in Cairo 
there are such a number of fascinating out-of-the-way 
corners which we are dying to see — unholy side- 
streets, picturesquely hidden nooks, and mysterious, 
shut-in life ; besides all the bazaars — 

Never mind ; the mosques did have a certain inter- 
est, especially the mosque of Al-Azhar, which is nine 
hundred years old and built about a great court — an 
old mosque when America was still undiscovered — 
and the mosque of Hassan, " whose prayer will nevair 
be accept," Abraham said (Abraham being our 
guide), "because when ze architec' have finish, ze 
Sultan Hassan have cut off hees han' so he cannot 
pro-duce him again." Napoleon's first gun in Egypt 
hit a minaret of Hassan's mosque, it is said, and it 
has had bad luck generally, perhaps because of the 
cruel act of its royal builder. We were not even 

322 



Ways That Are Egyptian 



required to put on slippers to enter it, so it can- 
•not be held in very great veneration. Then there is 
the mosque of Mohammed Ali, built within the last 
century and modern throughout, the only mosque 
in the world, I believe, to have electric lights ! 

It was Mohammed Ali who settled the Mameluke 
problem in the conclusive way which sultans adopt 
at times. The Mamelukes were the Janizaries of 
Egypt, though fewer in number. Still, there were 
enough of them to make trouble and keep matters 
stirred up, and Ali grew tired of them. So did the 
public, according to our guide: 

" Ali, he say to some people, 'You like get rid of 
zose Mameluke ?' an' all ze people say, ' Yez, of course.' 
So Ali he make big dinner, an' ze Mameluke come an' 
eat, an' have fine, big time." 

It was on the ist of March, 1811, that Ali issued his 
general invitation to the Mameluke leaders to attend 
a function at the Citadel ; and, after entertaining them 
hospitably, invited them to march through a nar- 
row passageway, which was suddenly closed at each 
end, while from above opened a musket-fire that 
presently concluded those Mamelukes — 470 of them — 
with the exception of one man, who is said to have 
leaped his horse through a window down a hundred 
feet or so, where he " Jump from hees horse and run — 
run fas' to Jaffa!" which was natural enough. 

There was only one trouble with that story. Abra- 
ham did not explain how this particular Mameluke 
came to have his horse at luncheon, and why, with 
or without horses, a number of those other Mamelukes 
did not follow him. Every Mameluke of my acquaint- 

323 



The Ship -Dwellers 



ance would have gone through that window, mounted 
or otherwise, and without calculating the distance 
to the ground. However, Abraham showed us the 
passage and the place of the leap, and later the graves 
of the 470, all of which was certainly convincing. 
Following the removal of the leaders, a general burial 
of Mamelukes took place throughout Egypt, since 
which time members of that organization have been 
extremely hard to catch. It must have been Ali's 
neat solution of the Mameluke problem which fifteen 
years later was copied in Constantinople by Mahmoud 
II., when he disposed of the Janizaries. 

It was at the tomb of a distinguished pasha — a 
fine, inviting place — that we saw a small green piece 
of the robe of Abraham. It was incorporated in a 
very sacred rug, one of the twelve which Cairo, 
Constantinople, and Damascus contribute to Mecca 
each year. We asked how Abraham's robe could hold 
out this way, and his namesake shrugged and smiled : 

"Oh, zay take little piece of ze real robe an' roll 
him 'roun' an' 'roun' wiz many piece of goods, an' 
zay become all ze robe of Abraham." 

Thus does a thread leaven a whole wardrobe. 

Laura and I escaped then. We did not care for 
any more tombs and mosques, and we did care a great 
deal for a street we had noticed where, squatted on 
the ground on both sides of it, their wares spread in 
the dust, were sellers of certain trinkets and jars 
which, though not of the past, had a fatal lure we 
could not all forget. Our driver was a black, scarred 
semi-Nubian who looked as if he had been through a 
fire, and had possibly five words of English. It does 

324 



Ways That Are Egyptian 



not matter — Menelek (so we named him) served us 
well, and will retain a place in my affections. 

We took the back track, and presently were in the 
street of small sellers, driving carefully, for there 
was barely room to pass between their displayed 
goods. Here and there we stooped to inspect, and 
we bought a water- jar for a piastre — an Egyptian 
piastre, which is really money and worth exactly 
five cents. Beyond the jars was a woman selling 
glass bracelets, such as the Arab women wear. I 
had wanted some of those from the beginning. I 
picked out a gay handful, and then discovered I had 
only a gold twenty-franc piece to pay with. The 
woman had never owned twenty francs, and no 
seller in the neighborhood could furnish the change. 
So I handed it to Menelek, who grinned and disap- 
peared while we sat there in the carriage waiting. 

I suppose he had to go miles in that neighborhood 
for as much change as that. I know we sat there in 
the sun and looked at all the curious things in all 
the assortments about us, over and over, and dis- 
cussed them and wondered if Menelek would ever 
return. It became necessary at last that he should 
do so. No vehicle could pass us in that narrow 
thoroughfare, and in a string behind there was 
collecting as motley an assortment of curiosities as 
ever were gathered in a menagerie. There was a 
curious two-wheeled cart or dray, drawn by water- 
buffaloes, upon which a man had his collection of 
wives out for an airing; there was a camel loaded 
with huge water- jars until they projected out over 
the heads of the selling people; there was a load of 

325 



The Ship -Dwellers 



hay drawn by a cow; there was a donkey train that 
reached back to the end of the street, and what lay 
beyond only Allah knew. 

The East is patient, but even the East has its limits. 
Presently we began to be interviewed by dark men — 
camel-drivers and the like — who had a way of flinging 
up their hands, while from behind came a rising tide 
of what I assumed to be imprecation. 

We were calm — that is, we assured each other that 
we were calm — and we told them quite pleasantly 
how matters stood. The result was not encouraging. 
One Bedouin grabbed the bridle, and I was at the 
point of slaying him with my water-jar when at the 
same moment appeared a member of the Cairo police 
— one of those with a tall red fez — also Menelek, our 
long - lost Menelek, with the change, out of which 
there was baksheesh for the discontented drivers. 
Everything was all right then. We headed the pro- 
cession. Behind us came the buffalo-cart — the wives, 
sandwiched fore and aft and smiling — the camel 
with his distended load of jars; the heaped-up little 
hay-wagon; the string of donkeys all in blue beads, 
with heaven knows what else trailing down the dis- 
tance. All the curses were removed; all the drivers 
singing; traffic congestion in the East was over. 

One of the first things we had noticed in Egypt was 
the curious brass spool affair which Arab women 
wear, suspended perpendicularly across the forehead, 
from the headgear to the top of their veil. It ex- 
tends from the nose upward, and has sharp, saw-like 
ridges on it, which look as if they would cut in. 
When we asked about these things we were told that 

326 



Ways That Are Egyptian 



they were worn to avert the evil eye, also as a handy 
means by which the husband may correct any little 
indiscretion on the part of one of his wives. He 
merely has to tap that brass spool with his cane or 
broomstick, or whatever is handy, and it cuts in and 
neatly reminds the wearer that she is a woman and 
had better behave. Family discipline has matured 
in this ancient land. 

I explained to Menelek now, in some fashion, that 
I wanted one of those brass things; whereupon we 
entered the narrow and thronging thoroughfare of 
commerce — a gay place, with all sorts of showy wares 
lavishly displayed — and went weaving in and out 
among the crowd to find it. Every other moment 
Menelek would shout something that sounded exactly 
like, "Oh, I mean it! Oh, I mean it!" which made us 
wonder what he meant in that emphatic way. 

Then all at once he changed to, "Oh, I sckmell it! 
Oh, I sckmell it!" 

"That's all right," we said; "so do we," for, though 
Cairo is cleaner than Constantinople, it was not over- 
sweet just there. But presently, when he changed 
again to, "Oh, I eat it! Oh, I eat it!" we drew the 
line. We said, "No, we do not go as far as that." 

We have learned now that those calls are really 
"O-i-menuk, o-i-schmeluk, " etc., and indicate that 
some one is to turn to the right or left, or simply get 
out of the way, as the case may be. We used them 
ourselves after that, which gave Menelek great joy. 



XXXIX 



WHERE HISTORY BEGAN 



HEN I glanced casually over the little heap of 



V V hand-bags that would accompany our party up 
the Nile — we were then waiting on the terrace of 
Shepheard's for the carriages — I noticed that my own 
did not appear to be of the number. I mentioned 
this to the guides, to the head-porter, to the clerk, 
to casual Bedouins in the hotel uniform, without 
arousing any active interest. Finally, I went on a 
still hunt on my own account. I found the missing 
bag out in the back area-way, with a Bedouin whom 
I had not seen before sitting on it, smoking dreamily 
and murmuring a song about lotus and moonlight and 
the spell of his lady's charms. Growing familiar with 
the habits of the country, I dispossessed him with my 
foot and marched back through the vast corridors 
carrying my bag myself. Still, I am sorry now I 
didn't contribute the baksheesh he expected. He was 
probably the cousin or brother or brother - in - law 
of one of my room servitors. They all have a line of 
those relatives, and they must live, I suppose, though 
it is difficult to imagine why. 

There was a red glow in the sky when our train 
slipped out of the Cairo station toward Luxor. The 
Nile was red, too, and against this tide of evening 
were those curious sail-boats of Egypt that are like 




Where History Began 



great pointed- winged butterflies, and the tall palms 
of the farther shore. By-and-by we began to run 
through mud villages that rose from the river among 
the palms, wonderfully picturesque in the gathering 
dusk. This was the Egypt of the pictures, the Egypt 
we have always known. No need to strain one's im- 
agination to accept this reality. You are possessed, 
enveloped by it, and I cannot think that I enjoyed 
it any the less from seeing it through the window 
of a comfortable diner, with the knowledge that an 
equally comfortable, even if tiny, state-room was re- 
served in the car ahead. The back of a camel or 
deck of a dahabiyah would be more picturesque, 
certainly — more poetic — but those things require 
time, and there are drawbacks, too. Railway travel 
in Egypt is both swift and satisfactory. The accom- 
modations differ somewhat from those of America, 
but not unpleasantly. 

We were a small party now. There were fewer 
than twenty of us — all English-speaking, except a 
young man who shared my apartment and was 
polite enough to pretend to understand my German. 

It was a little after 5 a.m. when I heard him getting 
up. I inquired if there was il Etwas los ?" which is the 
ship idiom for asking if anything had gone wrong. 
He said no, but that the sun would be upstanding 
directly, which brought me into similar action. One 
does not miss sunrises on the Nile, if one cares for 
sunrises anywhere. We hurried through our dressing 
and were out on the platform when the train drew 
up for water at Nag Hamadeh — a station like many 
others, surrounded by the green luxury of the Nile's 

329 



The Ship ^Dwellers 



fertile strip, with yellow desert and mountains press- 
ing close on either hand. It was just before sunrise. 
The eastward sky was all resonant with ruddy tones 
— a stately overture of its coming. Uplifting palms, 
moveless in the morning air, broke the horizon line, 
while nearer lay the low village — compact and flat of 
roof — a vast, irregular hive built of that old material 
of Egypt, bricks without straw. Below it the Nile re- 
peated the palms, the village, the swelling symphony 
of dawn. Only here and there was any sign of life. 
An Arab woman with a water- jar drowsed toward the 
river-bank; a camp of Bedouins with their camels 
and their tents were beginning to stir and kindle 
their morning fires. The railroad crosses the river 
here, and just as we were creeping out over the slow- 
moving flood the sun rose, and the orchestra of the 
sky broke into a majestic crescendo, as rare and ra- 
diant and splendid as it was when Memnon answered 
to its waking thrill and sang welcome to the day. 

The young man and I had forgotten each other, I 
think, for neither of us had spoken for some moments. 
Then we both spoke at once — "Wunderbar!" we 
said, "Wunderschonf" for I have trained myself to 
speak German even when strongly moved. Then 
with one impulse we looked at our watches. It was 
precisely six, and we remembered that it was the 
2 2d of March — the equinox. 

We stayed out there and saw the land awake — that 
old land which has awakened so many times and in 
so much the same fashion. Outside of its cities and 
its temples it cannot have changed greatly since the 
days of Rameses. It is still just a green, fertile 

33° 



Where History Began 



thread of life, watered and tilled in the manner of 
fifty centuries ago. They had to drag us in to 
breakfast at last, for we would be at Luxor before 
long, four hundred and fifty miles from Cairo; that 
is, at ancient Thebes, where — though the place has 
lingered for our coming a good four thousand years — 
"ze train he have not time to wait." 

We are in Thebes now, the ' ' city of a hundred gate- 
ways and twenty thousand chariots of war." Homer 
called it that, though it was falling to ruin even then. 
Homer was a poet, but his statistics are believed to 
be correct enough in this instance, for Diodorus, who 
saw the ruins a little before the Christian era, states 
that there were a hundred war stables, each capable 
of holding two hundred horses, "the marks and signs 
of which," he says, "are visible to this day." Of its 
glory in general he adds: "There was no city under 
the sun so adorned with so many and stately monu- 
ments of gold and silver and ivory, and multitudes 
of colossi and obelisks cut out of entire stone." Still 
further along Diodorus adds, "There, they say, are 
the wonderful sepulchres of the ancient kings, which 
for state and grandeur far exceed all that posterity 
can attain unto at this day." 

Coming from a historian familiar with Athens and 
Rome in the height of their splendor, this statement 
is worth considering. We have journeyed to Thebes 
to see the ruin of the mighty temples which Diodorus 
saw, and the colossi and the obelisks, and to visit 
the royal tombs of which he heard — now open to the 
light of day. 

We had glimpses of these things at the very moment 

33i 



The Ship-Dwellers 



of our arrival. The Temple of Luxor (so called) is 
but a step from the hotel, and, waiting on the terrace 
for our donkeys, we looked across the Nile to the 
Colossi of Memnon, still rising from the wide plain 
where once a thronging city stood — still warming to 
the sunrise that has never failed in their thirty-five 
hundred years. 

We were in no hurry to leave that prospect, but 
our donkeys were ready presently, and a gallant lot 
indeed. The Luxor donkeys are the best in Egypt, 
we are told, and we believe it. They are a mad, 
racing breed — fat, unwearied, and strenuous — the pick 
of their species. They can gallop all day in the 
blazing sun, and the naked rascal that races behind, 
waving a stick and shouting, can keep up with them 
hour after hour when an American would drop dead 
in five minutes. 

They are appropriately named, those donkeys. 
Mine was "Whiskey Straight," and he arrived accord- 
ingly. He was a gray, wild-headed animal, made 
of spring steel. We headed the procession that led 
away for the Temple of Karnak in a riotous stampede. 
Laura's donkey was "Whiskey and Soda" — a slightly 
milder proposition, but sufficient unto the day. I 
have never seen our ship-dwellers so unreserved in 
their general behavior, so "let loose, " as it were, from 
anything that resembled convention, as when we 
went cavorting through that Arab settlement of 
"El-Uksur, " where had been ancient Thebes. Beset 
with a mad, enjoying fear, our ladies — some of whom 
were no longer young and perhaps had never ridden 
before — broke into frantic and screaming prophecies 

33 2 



Where History Began 



of destruction, struggling to check their locomotion, 
their feet set straight ahead, skirts, scarfs, hats, hair 
streaming down the wind. It was no time for sce- 
nery — Egyptian scenery; we knew nothing, could 
attend to nothing, till at the towering entrance of the 
great Temple of Karnak we came to a sudden and 
confused halt. 

We dismounted there, shook ourselves together, 
and stared wonderingly up at those amazing walls 
whose relief carving and fresco tints the dry air of 
this rainless land has so miraculously preserved. 
And then presently we noticed that Gaddis, our 
guide for the Nile, had stepped quietly out before us, 
and with that placid smile he always wears had 
lifted his hand to the records of his ancestors. 

I want to speak a word just here of Gaddis. He is 
pure Copt, and the name "Copt" is from "Gypt" — 
that is, " Egypt " — the Copts being the direct descend- 
ants of the race that built ancient Thebes. His color 
is a clear, rich brown ; his profile might be a part of 
these wall decorations. Then there are his eyes — mere 
dreamy slits, behind which he dwells in an age far 
removed from ours, while his lips wear always that 
ineffable smile which belongs only to Egypt, its 
sculpture and its people, the smile that regards with 
gentle contemplation — and compassion — all trivial 
things. Young in years, Gaddis is as old as these 
monuments in reflection and mental heritage — a part 
with them of a vanished day. And but for his fez 
and little European coat, which with the sash and 
figured skirt complete the dress of the Egyptian 
guide, Gaddis might truly have been plucked from 
22 333 



The Ship -Dwellers 



these pictured walls. I should add that he reads the 
hieroglyphics and has all languages on his tongue — 
English, French, German — the Egyptian is born 
with these, I think; his voice is a drowsy hum that is 
pure music; his temper is as sweet and changeless 
as his smile. 

So much for Gaddis. He stood now with his lifted 
hand directed to the panoramic story of the past; 
then, in slow, measured voice : 

"Zis is ze great temple of Karnak — ze work of 
many king. Here you will see ze King Ram-e-ses II. 
wiz ze crown an' symbol of Upper an' Lower Egypt, 
making sacrifice of fruit and fowl an' all good sings 
to ze gawd Amm-Ra, in ze presence of Horus, ze 
hawk-headed sun-gawd, an' Anubis an' Osiris, ze 
gawd of ze under- worlid." 

Thus it was our sight-seeing in Upper Egypt began. 



XL 



KARNAK AND LUXOR 

THE Temple of Karnak cannot be described. The 
guide-books attempt it, but the result is only a 
maze of figures and detail for which the mind cares 
little. All the Greek temples on the Acropolis com- 
bined would make but a miniature showing by the 
side of Karnak. Most of the Egyptian kings, begin- 
ning as far back as 3000 B.C., had a hand in its building, 
and for above two thousand years it was in a state of 
construction, restoration, or repair. The result is an 
amazing succession of halls and columns, monoliths, 
and mighty walls — many of them tumbled and tum- 
bling now, but enough standing to show what a race 
once flourished here. Long ago the road over which 
we came from Luxor was an avenue eighty feet wide 
and a mile and a half long, connecting the two great 
temples. It was faced on each side with ram -head- 
ed sphinxes only a few feet apart. Most of them 
are gone now, but the few mutilated specimens left 
prompt one's imagination of that mighty boulevard. 
The Karnak of that day, with its various enclosures, 
is said to have covered a thousand acres. The mind 
does not grasp that, any more than it comprehends 
the ages of its construction, the history it has seen. 
It is like trying to grasp the distance to the stars. 
No one may say who began Karnak, but the 

335 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Usertsens of the earliest Theban Dynasty had a hand 
in its building, and after them the other dynasties 
down to the Ptolemaic days. Thothmes III. and 
his aunt, the wonderful Queen Hatasu — the ablest 
woman of her time — were among its builders, and 
these two set up obelisks, erected pylons and vast 
columned halls. This was about 1600 B.C., when 
the glory of Egypt was at flood-tide. Two centuries 
later the mighty Seti I., whose mummied form sleeps 
to-day in the Museum at Cairo, began what is known 
as the great Hypostile Hall, finished by his still 
mightier son, Rameses II., whose mummy likewise 
reposes in Cairo, father and son together. Rameses 
built other additions to Karnak, and crowded most 
of them with pictures and statues of himself and the 
sculptured glorification of his deeds. He was, in 
fact, not only the greatest king, but the greatest 
egotist the world has ever known, and in the end 
believed himself a god. It is said that he built more 
than seventy temples altogether, chiefly to hold his 
statues, and that he put his name on a number that 
had been built by his predecessors. It has been 
hinted that to his title of "The Great" the word 
"Advertiser" should have been added, and the fact 
that he is now on exhibition in a glass case must be 
a crowning gratification to him, if he knows it. It 
should be mentioned that Rameses II. is thought to be 
one of the oppressors of the Israelites, which may 
tend to arrange his period and personality in the 
Biblical mind. 

I am wandering away from the subject in hand. I 
want to talk about Karnak, and I find myself talking 

336 



Karnak and Luxor 



of kings. But, then, one cannot talk about Karnak — 
not intelligently. One must see Karnak, and he will 
believe himself dreaming all the time, and he will 
come away silent. The Romans came to Karnak 
when the Egyptians had finished with their building, 
and by-and-by the early Christians, who could always 
be depended upon to pull down and mutilate and 
destroy anything that was particularly magnificent. 
Our old friend, the good Queen Helena, arrived, and 
the temples of Egypt crumbled before the blight of 
her fanaticism. But I must change cars again. I 
get a little rabid when I take up Queen Helena and 
her tribe. 

We followed Gaddis from arch to pylon, from 
enclosure to sanctuary — we passed down colonnades 
that one must see to believe. There are two kinds 
of columns in Egypt, by-the-way, the Lotus and the 
Papyrus — the former with a capital that opens out 
like a flaring bowl, the cup of the lotus-flower; the 
other with a capital that is more like an opening bud. 
The lotus symbolizes the Delta country, Lower 
Egypt; the papyrus stands for Upper Egypt, the 
country of the Nile, where we now are. Both are 
used in these temples, and here in Karnak there is a 
hall of Lotus columns — one hundred and thirty-four 
in number — twelve of them sixty feet high and twelve 
feet through! 

That is the great Hypostile Hall of Seti I., and I 
wish the English language were big enough, and I on 
sufficiently good terms with it to convey the over- 
whelming impression of that place. Try to conceive 
an architectural forest of the size of a city block, 

337 



The Ship -Dwellers 



planted with sculptured and painted columns and 
filled with sunlight — the columns toweiing till they 
seem to touch the sky, and of such thickness that six 
men with extended arms, finger-tip to finger-tip, can 
barely span them round. The twelve mightier 
columns form a central avenue that simply dwarfs 
into insignificance any living thing that enters it. 
You suddenly become an insect when you stand 
between those columns and look up, and you have 
the feeling that you are likely to be stepped on. The 
rest of that colossal assembly stretch away on either 
side and are only a degree smaller. All are painted 
with the four colors of the Nile — mellow tones of 
blue, red, green and yellow, signifying high and low 
Nile, green fields and harvest — imperishable pigments 
as fresh and luminous under this sunlit sky as when 
they were laid there by artists who finished and put 
their brushes away more than three thousand years 
ago. How poor are mere words in the presence of 
this mighty reality which has outlived so many 
languages — will outlive all the puny languages that 
try to convey it now! 

Looking down the great central avenue of Seti's 
hall, we beheld at the end — standing as true to-day 
as when she placed it there — the graceful granite 
obelisk of Queen Hatasu. 

"Set up in honor of father Amen," she relates in 
her inscription on the base. She adds that she 
covered the tip with copper that it might be seen at 
a great distance, and tells how the monolith and its 
mate (now lying broken near it) were hewn from the 
Assuan quarries and brought down the Nile to Thebes. 

33* 



Karnak and Luxor 



I may say here that we did not read these inscriptions 
ourselves. We could do it, of course, if we had time, 
but Gaddis, who is at least five thousand years old, 
inside, is better at it than we could be in a brief 
period like that, so we depend on him a good deal. 
Gaddis can read anything. A bird without a head, 
followed by a pair of legs walking, a row of saw- 
teeth, a picked chicken, a gum-drop and a comb, all 
done in careful outline, mean " Homage to the Horus 
of the two horizons " to Gaddis, though I have been 
unable as yet to see why. 

We went into the Hall, or Temple, of Khonsu, the 
moon-god, and here was a breath-taking collection of 
papyrus columns, short, thick, built to stand through 
the ages on the uncertain foundation of this alluvial 
plain. We passed into a sanctuary where the priests 
of Amen prepared the sacrifice, and Gaddis read the 
story on the walls, and pointed out for the twentieth 
time, perhaps, Horus, the hawk-headed god, and Hapi, 
his son, who has a dog head and can hardly be called 
handsome; also Anubis, the jackal-headed god of the 
Under World. We came to a temple with a wall 
upon which Seti recorded his victories over the 
forces of Syria, and pictured himself in the act of 
destroying an army single handed by gathering their 
long hair into a single twist preparatory to smiting 
off this combined multitude of heads at a blow. We 
follow Gaddis through long tumbling avenues and 
corridors of decorated walls; we climbed over fallen 
columns that prostrate were twice as high as our 
heads; we studied the records which those old kings, 
in ages when all the rest of the world was myth and 

339 



The Ship -Dwellers 



fable set up to preserve the story of their deeds. 
And remember, all these columns and walls were 
not only completely covered with figures carved in 
relief, but tinted in those unfading colors, subdued, 
harmonious, and more beautiful than I can tell. 

How little and how feebly I seem to be writing 
about this stupendous ruin, yet I must conclude 
presently for lack of room. We went into the 
Ramesseum, a temple literally lined with heroic 
statues of Rameses, where I made a picture of the 
fly-brush brigade, as we call ourselves now, because in 
Upper Egypt a fly-brush is absolutely necessary not 
alone to comfort, but to very existence. The fly 
here is not the ordinary house variety, fairly coy and 
flirtatious if one has a newspaper or other impromptu 
weapon, retiring now and again to a safe place for 
contemplation; no, the Egyptian fly is different. He 
never retires and he is not in the least coy. He makes 
for you in a cloud, and it is only by continuous industry 
that you can beat him off at all. Furthermore, he 
begins business the instant he touches, and he has 
continuously the gift which our fly sometimes has on 
a sultry, muggy day — the art of sticking with his feet, 
which drives you frantic. So you buy a fly-brush the 
instant you land in Upper Egypt, and you keep it 
going constantly from dawn to dark. The flies retire 
then, for needed rest. 

We passed through another avenue of ram-headed 
sphinxes (some of the heads were gone) which 
Rameses built, and stood outside of the great temple 
of Amen, once called the "Throne of the World." Its 
magnificent pylons, or entrance walls, are one hundred 

34o 



Karnak and Luxor 



and fifty feet high and three hundred broad. We 
ascended one of these for a general view of the vast 
field of ruin. 

Piled and tumbled and flung about lay the mighty 
efforts of a mighty race. At one place excavating 
was still going on, and a regiment of little boys were 
running back and forth with baskets of dirt on their 
heads, singing and sweating in the blazing sun, 
earning as much as two piastres (ten cents) a day. 
Men were working, too ; they receive quite fancy sums 
— twenty cents a day, some of them. 

Now that we were outside of the shaded temple 
and sanctuary enclosures our party was not very 
game. It was our first day in Upper Egypt, and the 
flies and the sun made a pretty deadly combination. 
We began to complain, and to long for the cool 
corridors and fizzy drinks and protecting screens of 
the hotel. We might have played golf or tennis in 
that sun, but seeing ruins was different, and we began 
to pray for the donkeys again. So Gaddis led us 
around by the Sacred Lake, where once the splendid 
ceremonials were performed — it is only a shallow pool 
now — and then once more we were on the donkeys, 
strung out in a crazy, shrieking stampede for the 
hotel. Gaddis rode near me. His donkey was a 
racer, too, but Gaddis did not laugh or cry out, or 
.anything of the sort. He only wore that gentle 
serene smile, the smile of Egypt, observing trivial 
things. 

In the afternoon we visited the Temple of Luxor, 
that beautiful structure which Amenophis III. built 

34i 



The Ship -Dwellers 



on the banks of the Nile. Luxor is Karnak on a 
smaller scale, though big enough in all conscience, 
and it is not all excavated yet. Debris had covered 
this temple to the very top, and it is not so long ago 
that a village was built on a level with the capitals 
of these columns. When M. Maspero, in 1883, began 
his work of excavation, the natives naturally pro- 
tested against the uncovering of the ''heathen" ruins 
at the expense of their mud huts. The work went on, 
however, and to-day a large part of the magnificent 
architecture stands revealed, once more reflecting its 
columns in the Nile. 

There is still a quantity of debris to be removed. 
One end of the Temple is full of it, and may remain so 
a good while. On top of this mass, some five hundred 
years ago, a Mohammedan mosque was built by the 
descendants of a saint named Abu Haggag, and 
sufficient of his family are left to this day to hold that 
mosque intact against all would-be excavators. How- 
ever, the mosque itself begins to look pretty old. If 
the diggers keep encroaching, it may slide off into 
the Temple some day, saints and all. 

Luxor, as a whole, is better preserved than Karnak. 
I suppose the heaped-up debris kept the columns in 
position during the last ten or a dozen centuries. I 
wish it had been there when the early Christian came 
along. Cambyses of Persia, who burned everything 
that would burn in Egypt, about 527 B.C., blackened 
the walls of this temple with fire, the marks of which 
show to this day, but he was nothing to the followers 
of Queen Helena. Even the guide-book, which is 
likely to be conservative in any comment that may 

342 



Karnak and Luxor 



touch upon the faith of its readers, says concerning 
the followers of Helena: ''Not content with turning 
certain sections of it into churches, the more fanatical 
among them smashed statues, and disfigured bas- 
reliefs and wrecked shrines with characteristic savage 
and ignorant zeal." 1 

There ought to be a painting or a marble group 
somewhere entitled "Early Christian at Work" — a 
lean-faced, stringy-haired maniac with sledge, mur- 
dering a symbolized figure of Defenceless Art in the 
Far East. The early Christian is said to have de- 
stroyed forty-five thousand statues in Thebes in one 
day. 

Still, those statues may not matter so much — they 
were probably all of Rameses the Great, and there are 
enough of him left. The Luxor Temple had them 
in all sizes, and of all materials, from granite to 
alabaster. Also some of "Mrs. Rameses," as Gaddis 
called her — no particular Mrs. Rameses — there having 
been several of her; just a sort of generic type of 
connubial happiness, I suppose. Mrs. Rameses, by 
the way, does not cut much figure in the statuary. 
She usually comes only about to the knee of the King, 
though she is life-size even then, for his own statues 
are colossal, ranging anywhere from fifteen to fifty 
feet high. That was to represent their difference in 
importance, of course, an idea which the women 
members of our party seemed to disapprove. 2 

One of the statues of Rameses was found in a 

1 Cook 's Egypt, page 562. 

2 At Abou Simbel there are sitting statues of Rameses the 
Great which, if standing erect, would be eighty-three feet tall. 

343 



The Ship -Dwellers 



curious manner. A guide only a little while ago 
was lecturing to a party of tourists, while a young 
lady not far away was sketching a corner of the ruin. 
The sketcher stopped to listen to the guide's talk, 
and when he had finished said to the boy who was 
keeping the flies from her : 

"Go up on that heap of rubbish and see what that 
stone is." 

It was the rubbish that slopes down from the old 
mosque. The boy climbed up, pulled away the trash, 
and uncovered the head of one of the most perfect 
Rameseses yet discovered. 

Originally the Temple of Luxor was five hundred 
feet long, one hundred and eighty feet wide, and, as 
before mentioned, was connected with Karnak by a 
double row of ram-headed sphinxes. Amenophis III. 
built it about 1500 b.c, and it was regarded as the 
most beautiful of Egyptian temples. Then came his 
son, Amenophis IV., who, being a sun-worshipper 
after the manner of his Mesopotamian mother, cut 
away the name of the Egyptian god Amen and set up 
a new worship here. It was a brief innovation. The 
priests made it too hot for the Heretic King. He gave 
up the struggle after a time, went into the desert 
farther down the Nile, and built there a city and 
temples of his own. Then this temple was sacred to 
the old religion again. It remained so until Alexander 
came, cut his name here and there, and probably 
worshipped his own assortment of gods. Later came 
the Roman and the early Christian; still later the 
Mohammedan established ceremonies and reconstruct- 
ed shrines. 

344 



Karnak and Luxor 



We had all the old sacrifices and processions and 
gods and victories over again in Luxor, including the 
picture story of the birth of Amenophis III., which 
depicts an immaculate conception; an annunciation; 
a visitation of wise men with gifts, executed about 
1500 B.C. 

After which we returned to the hotel ; but when the 
sun was low in the west beyond the Nile and the air 
was getting balmy, I slipped back and sat in the old 
Temple in the quiet, and thought of a number of 
things. Then as the sun slipped below the verge, a 
figure stepped out on the minaret just over my 
head and began that weird thrilling chant which 
once heard will remain forever unforgotten, the cry 
of the East — "Allah il Allah," the Muezzin's call to 
prayer. 

So it is still a place of worship. The voice of faith 
has reached down thirty-four centuries, and whatever 
the form, or the prophet, or the priest, it is all em- 
bodied there at evening and at morning in the cry, 
"There is no God but God." 



XLI 



THE STILL VALLEY OF THE KINGS 

IT was early next morning when we crossed the Nile 
to the rhythm of a weird chorus which the boatmen 
sang to the beat of the oars. It is probably older 
than these temples, and the boatmen themselves do 
not know the meaning of the words, Gaddis said. 
One intones and the others answer, and it is in minor 
keys with a dying fall at the .end, except now and 
then when a curious lifting note drops in, like a flash 
of light on the oars. Bound for the Valley of the 
Kings, the House of Hatasu, and the Colossi of Mem- 
non, it seemed a fitting overture. 

The donkeys were waiting on the other bank — the 
same we had used yesterday, fat and fresh as ever, 
and the same boys were there calling and gesticulating 
to their special charges of the day before. There are 
always a few more donkey-boys than is necessary, 
it seems, all of them wildly eager for the privilege 
of racing all day in the perishing sun, urging the 
donkeys and yelling for baksheesh at every jump — not 
that they expect to get it until the end of the day, 
but as a traditional part of the performance. The 
donkey-boy gets nothing, we are told, but what one 
is pleased to give him — the donkey hire going to the 
Sheik, who owns the donkeys and lets the boys get 
what they can. I would write a good deal about 

346 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



those half -naked, half -savage, tireless donkey -boys 
if permitted. They and their brothers, and their 
cousins even to the fourth remove, who come in like 
a charging army in the wild baksheesh skirmish at 
the end, interest me. 

Mounted, we led away in the usual stampede along 
canals and by lush green fields, across the fertile 
strip that borders the Nile. The green is rather wide 
here — as much as a mile, I should think, and it was 
pleasant going through the still morning if one kept 
well forward in the procession — in front of the dust 
that rose mightily behind us. Every little way 
where we slackened speed, detachments of sellers 
would charge from the roadside with trinkets, imita- 
tion scarabs, and images, but more notably with 
fragments (and these were genuine enough) of what 
long ago — as much as three or four thousand years, 
perhaps — had been human beings like ourselves. 
Remnants of mummies they were, quarried out of 
the barren hills where lie not only the kings but the 
millions who in the glory of Egypt lived and died in 
Thebes. The hills are full of them, Gaddis said, and 
unearthing them has become an industry. 

It was rather grewsome at first to be offered such 
things — to have a head, or a hand, or a foot thrust up 
under your eyes, and with it an outstretched palm 
for payment. The prices demanded were not very 
high, and the owners, the present owners, would take 
less — a good deal less than the first quotation. A 
physician in our party bought a head — hard and 
black as old mahogany, with some bits of gold-leaf 
still sticking to it — for five francs, and I was offered 

347 



The Ship -Dwellers 



a baby's hand (it had been soft and dimpled once — 
it was dark and withered now) for a shilling. 

We crossed the line which "divides the desert 
from the sown" — a sharp, perfectly distinguishable 
line in Egypt — and were in the sand, the sun getting 
high and blazing down, fairly drenching us with its 
flame. We thought it would be better when we 
entered the hills, but that was a mistake. It was 
worse, for there was not a particle of growing shade, 
not a blade of any green thing, and there seemed no 
breath of life in that stirless air. 

Remember it never rains here; these hills have 
never known water since the Flood, but have been 
baking in this vast kiln for a million years. You 
will realize that it must be hot, then, but you will 
never know how hot until you go there. Here and 
there a rock leaned over a little and made a skimpy 
blue shadow, which we sidled into as we passed for a 
blessed instant of relief. We understood now the 
fuller meaning of that Bible phrase, "As the shadow 
of a great rock in a weary land." This was a weary 
land with shadow j far between. Now and then those 
astonishing donkeys broke into a gallop and stirred up 
a little scorching wind, the unflagging boys capering 
and shouting behind. 

It seemed an endless way, up into these calcined 
hills to the Burial-place of Kings, but by-and-by there 
were traces of ruins and excavation, and we . heard 
the throb of a dynamo on the quivering air. We 
dismounted then, and Gaddis led us up a burning 
little steep to what at first seemed a great tunnel into 
the mountain-side. How deep and cool and inviting 

348 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



it looked up there; we would go in, certainly. Was 
it really a tomb ? No wonder those old kings looked 
forward to such a place. 

It was merely an entrance to a tomb — a tunnel, 
truly, and of such size that I believe two railway 
trains could enter it side by side and two more on 
top of them ! I think most of us had the idea — I know 
I did — that we would go down ladders into these 
tombs, and that they would be earthy, cheerless 
places, more interesting than attractive. 

They are the most beautiful places I ever saw. 
The entrances — vast, as I have stated — go directly in 
from the hillside ; the rock floors are dry and clean, 
while the side- walls and the ceilings are simply a mass 
of such carving and color as the world nowhere else 
contains. An electric dynamo set up in a tomb that 
was never finished (that of Rameses XII., I believe) 
supplies illumination for these homes of the kingly 
dead, and as you follow deeper and deeper into the 
heart of the mountain your wonder grows at the 
inconceivable artistic effort and constructive labor 
that have been expended on those walls. Deeper, and 
still deeper, along a gradual decline that seems a 
veritable passage to the underworld. Here and there, 
at the side, are antechambers or avenues that lead 
away — we wonder whither. 

Now and again Gaddis paused to explain the 
marvellous story of the walls — the progress of the 
King to the underworld — his reception there, his 
triumphs, his life in general in that long valley of 
spirits which ran parallel with Egypt and was neither 
above nor below the level of the earth. It was this 
23 349 



The Ship -Dwellers 



form and idea of the underworld that the shape of 
these tombs was intended to express, while their 
walls illustrate the happy future life of the King. 
Chapters from the "Book of the Underworld" (a sort 
of descriptive geography of the country) and from 
the "Book of the Dead" (a manual of general in- 
struction as to customs and deportment in the new 
life) cover vast spaces. Here and there a design 
was not entirely worked out, but the sketch was 
traced in outline, which would indicate that perhaps 
the King died before his tomb (always a life-work) 
was complete. 

Now, realize : This gorgeous passage was nearly five 
hundred feet long, cut into the living rock, and 
opened into a vast pillared and vaulted chamber ful- 
ly sixty feet long by forty wide and thirty high — the 
whole covered with splendid decorations that the dry 
air and protection have preserved as fresh and beauti- 
ful as the day they were finished so many centuries ago. 
This was the royal chamber, empty now, where in 
silent state King Seti I. once lay. We are a frivolous 
crowd, but we were awed into low-voiced wonder 
at the magnitude of this work, the mightiness of 
a people who could provide so overwhelmingly for 
their dead. 

I do not remember how many such tombs we 
visited, but they were a good many, including those 
of Rameses I. and II., the father and the mighty son 
of Seti I., all three of whom now sleep in the Cairo 
Museum. Also the tomb of Rameses IX., one of the 
finest of the lot. 

In some of the tombs the sarcophagi were still in 

35° 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



place, but all are empty of occupants except one. 
This was the splendid tomb of Amenophis II., of the 
Eighteenth Dynasty, who lived in the glory of Egypt, 
1600 b.c, a warrior who slew seven Syrian chiefs with 
his own hand. Gaddis had not told us what to 
expect in that tomb, and when we had followed 
through the long declining way to the royal chamber 
and beheld there, not an empty sarcophagus but a 
king asleep, we were struck to silence with that three 
thousand five hundred years of visible rest. 

The top of the sarcophagus is removed, and is 
replaced by heavy plate glass. Just over the sleeper's 
face there is a tiny electric globe, and I believe one 
could never tire of standing there and looking at 
that quiet visage, darkened by age, but beautiful in 
its dignity ; unmoved, undisturbed by the storm and 
stress of the fretful years. 

How long he has been asleep! The Israelites were 
still in bondage when he fell into that quiet doze, 
and for their exodus, a century or two later, he did 
not care. Hector and Achilles and Paris and the 
rest had not battled on the Plains of Troy ; the gods 
still assembled on Mt. Olympus ; Rome was not yet 
dreamed. He had been asleep nigh a thousand years 
when Romulus quit nursing the she-wolf to build 
the walls of a city which would one day rule the 
world. The rise, the conquest, the decline of that 
vast empire he never knew. When her armies swept 
the nations of the East and landed upon his own 
shores he did not stir in his sleep. The glory of 
Egypt ebbed away, but he did not care. Old religions 
perished; new gods and new prophets replaced the 

35i 



The Ship -Dwellers 



gods and prophets he had known — it mattered not to 
him, here in this quiet underworld. Through every 
change he lay here in peace, just as he lies to-day, 
so still, so fine in his kingly majesty — upon his face 
that soft electric glow which seems in no wise out 
of place, because it has come as all things come at 
last to him who waits. 

In a sort of anteroom near the royal chamber lie 
the mummies of three adherents of the King, each 
with a large hole in the skull and a large gash in the 
breast — royal slaves, no doubt, sent to bear their 
liege company. I remember one of them as having 
very long thick curly hair — a handsome fellow, I 
suppose; a favorite who could not, or would not, be 
left behind. 

A number of other royal mummies were found in 
the Tomb of Amenophis II., so that at some period 
of upheaval it must have been used as a hiding-place 
for the regal dead, as was a cave across the mountains 
at Der al-Bahari. Perhaps those who secreted them 
here thought that a king who in life had slain seven 
chiefs with his own hand would make a potent 
guard. They were not mistaken. Through all the 
centuries the guests of that still house lay undis- 
turbed. 

We paused, though briefly — for it was fairly roast- 
ing outside — at the excavations of our countryman, 
Mr. Theodore M. Davis, who has brought to light so 
many priceless relics in this place; after which we 
bought an entire stock of oranges from an Arab who 
suddenly appeared from nowhere, sucked them raven- 
ously, and set out, leading our donkeys up a broiling 

352 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



precipitous path over the mountains, for the house of 
Queen Hatasu, which lies at the base of the cliffs on 
the other side. 

It was not very far, I suppose, but it was strenuous 
and seemed miles. We were rewarded, however, 
when we reached the plateau of the mountain top. 
From the brink of the great cliff we could look out 
over the whole plain of Thebes, its villages and its 
ruins, its green cultivation and its blazing sands. 
Once it was a vast city — 1 ' the city of a hundred gates 
and twenty thousand chariots of war." Through its 
centre flowed the Nile, a very fountain of life, its one 
outlet to the world. To the east and the west lay 
Nature's surest fortifications, the dead hills and the 
encompassing sands. It is estimated that the city 
of Paris could stand on this level sweep and that 
Thebes overspread it all. As at Ephesus, we 
tried to re-create that vanished city, but we did 
not try long, for the mid - day sun was too frying 
hot. 

So we descended to the rest-house of Der al-Bahari, 
where we created a famine in everything resembling 
refreshments, liquid or otherwise, in that wayside 
shelter. Then out on the piazza we swung our fly- 
brushes, beat off the sellers of things, and tried to 
assimilate our half-baked knowledge. 

We were in a mixed state of temples and tombs and 
dynasties and localities — of sacrificial processions, 
and gods of the "Underworld." The sun had got 
into our heads, too, and some of the refreshments had 
been of strange color and curious brands. It is no 
wonder that we drifted into deliriums of verse. I 

353 



The Ship -Dwellers 



have forgotten who had the first seizure, but from 
internal evidence it was probably Fosdick — Fosdick 
of Ohio. This is it: 

Queen Hatasu, of Timbuctoo, 

She lived a busy life; 
She fell in love with King Khufu, 

And she became his wife. 

She put him in a pyramid — 

He put her in another, 
And now four thousand years have gone 

You can't tell one from tother. 

I do remember how we tried to reason with the 
author; how we explained to him carefully that 
Hatasu, who was also called Hatshepset and certain 
other names, did not hail from Timbuctoo; also that 
King Khufu, alias Cheops, had been in his pyramid 
at least two thousand years, with fourteen dynasties 
on top of him, when that lady of the Nile was born. 
It was no use ; he turned a glazed eye on us and said 
all periods looked alike to him, that art was long and 
life fleeting, that a trifle of two thousand years was 
as a few grains on the Egyptian sands of time. We 
saw, then, he was hopeless, but later he improved and 
seemed sorry. It did not matter; another member 
of the party had been taken with the poetic madness, 
and we gave room for his attack. It was of milder 
form, and mercifully short: 

King Rameses, he strove to please, 

And put his foes to flight; 
To celebrate his victories 

He toiled both day and night. 

354 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



He filled full threescore temples with 

His statues vast and grim, 
And some of Mrs. Rameses 

Who wa n't knee-high to him. 

I don't know why a malady of this sort should fall 
upon our party. Such things never happened on the 
ship, but then Egypt is different, as I have said. 
There was one more outbreak before we got the germ 
destroyed : 

Behold the halls of Seti I., 

And also Seti II. ; 
Likewise of old Amenhetep 

And haughty Hatasu. 

They lived in state, their days were great 

And glided gayly by; 
Sometimes they used to rail at fate, 

The same as you and I. 

Oh, Seti I., your race is run, 

And also Seti II., 
And lizards sleep where ages creep 

In the house of Hatasu. 

It was time to check the tendency; it was getting 
serious. 

We went up to the "House of Hatasu" — all that 
is left of it — a beautiful fragment of what was built 
by the great Queen as her Holy of Holies. It is 
unlike other temples we have seen, with its square 
columns ; its beautiful open portico ; its fine ceiling, 
still perfect in workmanship and coloring. Queen 
Hatasu had ideas of her own about building; also, 
her own architect. His name was Senmut, and his 
tomb, a mile from the temple, commands a view of 
it to this day. 

355 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Hatasu once made a notable expedition to the 
lower east coast of Africa — to Punt, as it was called 
then, and she has recorded it on these walls. It 
shows the natives bringing valuable presents — woods, 
spices, gold, and the like — in exchange for glass 
beads and tin whistles, after the customary manner 
of such barter. A part of the relief shows the Prince 
of Punt and "Mrs. Punt," whose figure was certainly 
remarkable, followed by their family, all with hands 
raised in deference to the Egyptian Queen. 

It was near here, in 1881, that the cave or pit was 
found containing the mummies of many kings, in- 
cluding Seti I., Rameses II., and others who had been 
stored here for safety. Arabs had been selling royal 
scarabs for some time, and the archaeologists finally 
discovered the secret of their supply. It was a 
priceless find, and with the treasures of the tomb of 
Amenophis II., made the museum of Cairo the 
richest archaeological depository in the world. 

We put in the afternoon visiting temples, mostly 
of Rameses the Great, and looking at statues which 
he had caused to be erected of himself wherever 
there was room. I remember one colossal granite 
figure of that self-sufficient king, lying prostrate on 
the sand now, estimated to weigh a thousand tons — 
which is to say two million pounds. That statue was 
sixty feet high when it stood upright, and it is cut 
like a gem. It was brought down from Assuan in 
one piece, by barge, as was the enormous granite 
base, which is thirty feet long, sixteen feet wide, and 
eight feet thick. 

I remember, too, some sun-dried brick — brick 

356 



The Still Valley of the Kings 



made by the Israelites, maybe — with the imprint 
of Rameses still on them, uneffaced after thirty- 
three centuries. The sun bakes hard in Egypt; 
no other kiln is needed. I remember a temple of 
Rameses III. and a pictorial record of one of his 
victories. His soldiers had reported a killing of 
twelve thousand of the enemy ; he said : 

"Go bring the evidence. If you have those dead 
men anywhere you can bring something to prove it." 

So the army returned and got the right hands of 
their victims. The story is all cut there on the 
walls, and the hands are there too. 

Rameses III. knew the custom inaugurated by his 
ancestor "The Great," of eliminating old names 
with new ones, and he took measures accordingly by 
cutting his own inscriptions deep. Some of them 
sink ten inches into the walls and will stay there a good 
while. 

I had noticed one curious thing along the outer 
walls of all these old temples, to wit: row after row 
of smooth egg-shaped holes, ranging irregularly, one 
above the other, from the base upward — sometimes 
to the very top. It was as if they had been dug out 
by some animal or insect. I asked Gaddis, at last, 
what they were, and he told me this curious thing. 

The childless Arab woman, he said, for ages had 
believed that some magic in these walls could make 
them fruitful, so had come and rubbed patiently 
with th ir fingers until they worked a few grains of 
the sandstone into a cup of water, which they drank 
with a prayer of hope. They had begun, he said, in 
that far-off time when the temples stood as clear of 

357 



The Ship-Dwellers 



rubbish as they do to-day ; and, as the years heaped 
up the debris, these anxious women had rubbed 
higher and higher up the walls until, with the drift of 
the ages, they had reached the very top. So there the 
record stands to-day, and when one realizes how little 
of that stone can be rubbed away with the finger-end ; 
how comparatively few must have been the childless 
mothers, and then sees how innumerable and deep 
those holes are, he gets a sudden and comprehensive 
grasp of the vast stretch of time these walls stood 
tenantless, vanishing, and unregarded, save by those 
generations of barren women. 

We raced away for the Colossi of Memnon, where, 
I fear, we did not linger as long as was proper. It 
was growing late — we were very tired and were over- 
full of undigested story and tangled chronology. 
Also the scarab men and flies were especially bad 
just there. We were willing to take a bare look at 
that majestic pair who have watched the sun rise 
morning after morning while a great city vanished 
away from around them, and then go steaming away 
across the sands for the Nile and the cool rest of the 
hotel. 

Such a time as we had settling with those donkey- 
boys — the old white-turbaned sheik, owner of the 
donkeys, squatting and smoking indifferently while 
the storm raged about him. But it was over at last, 
and the boatmen sang again — a quiet afterlude of 
that extraordinary day — and collected baksheesh on 
the farther shore. 



XLII 



THE HIGHWAY OF EGYPT 

THERE could hardly be a daintier boat than the 
Memnon. It just holds our party; it is as clean 
and speckless as possible, and there is an open deck 
the full width of the tiny steamer, with pretty rugs 
and lazy chairs, where we may lounge and drowse and 
dream and look out on the gently passing panorama 
of the Nile. 

For we have left Luxor, and are floating in this 
peaceful fashion down to Cairo, resting in the delight 
of it, after those fierce temple-hunting, tomb-visiting 
days. Not that we are entirely through with temples 
and the like. Here and there we tie up to the bank, 
and go ashore and scamper away on donkeys to some 
tumbled ruin, but it is a diversion now, not a business, 
and we find such stops welcome. For the most part 
we spend our days just idling, and submitting to the 
spell of Egypt, which has encompassed us and pos- 
sessed us as it will encompass and possess any one 
who has a trace of the old human tendency to drift 
and dream. 

It has been said of Boston that it is less a locality 
than a state of mind. I wish I had said that — of 
Egypt. I will say it now, and without humor, for 
of this land it is so eminently true. A mere river- 
bank ; a filament of green ; a long slender lotus-stem, 

359 



The Ship -Dwellers 



of which the Delta is the flower — that is Egypt. Re- 
mote — shut in by the desert and the dead hills — it 
is far less a country and a habitation than a psycho- 
logical condition which all the mummied ages have 
been preparing — which the traveller from the earliest 
moment is bound to feel. It has lived so long! It 
had made and recorded its history when the rest of 
the world was dealing in nursery-tales ! The glamour 
of that stately past has become the spell, the enchant- 
ment of to-day. The magic of the lotus grows more 
potent with the years. 

It is such a narrow land! Sometimes the lifeless 
hills close in on one side or the other to the water's 
edge. Nowhere is the fertile strip wide, for its fer- 
tility depends wholly on the water it receives from 
the Nile, and when that water is drawn up by hand 
with a goat-skin pail and a well-sweep — a shaduf, as 
they call it — it means that fields cannot be very exten- 
sive,even if there were room,which as a rule there is not. 

Think of watering a whole wheat-field with a well- 
sweep and a pail! Furthermore, where the banks are 
high the water is sometimes lifted three times between 
the Nile and the surface, and much of it is wasted in 
transit. 1 It is the oldest form of irrigation; the 
hieroglyphics show that it was in use in Egypt five 
thousand years ago. It is also still the most popular 
form in Upper Egypt. We saw a good many of the 
sakkiek — primitive and wastful water-wheels pro- 
pelled by a buffalo or a camel or a cow — and at rare 
intervals a windmill, where some Englishman has 
established a plantation, but it is the shaduf that 
largely predominates. 

360 




THINK OF WATERING A WHOLE WHEAT-FIELD WITH A 
WELL-SWEEP AND A PAIL 



The Highway of Egypt 



The mud villages among the date-palms are un- 
failingly picturesque ; the sail - boats of the Nile — 
markab they call them — drifting down upon us like 
great butterflies, have a charm not to be put in words ; 
the life along the shores never loses its interest; the 
sun sets and the sun rises round the dreamy days 
with a marvel of color that seems each time more 
wonderful. Then there is the moonlight. But I 
must not speak of Egyptian moonlight or I shall lose 
my sense of proportion altogether, for it is like no 
other light that ever lay on sea or land. 

We do not travel through the night, but anchor at 
dusk until daybreak. It is curious to reflect that 
one sees the entire country on a trip like this, if he 
rises early. We do rise early, most of us — though the 
cool nights (nights are always cool in Egypt) and 
the stillness are an inducement to sleep — and we are 
usually very hungry before breakfast comes along. 
One may have coffee on the deck if he likes — the 
picturesque Arab will bring it joyfully, especially 
where there is a baksheesh at the end. It is good 
coffee, too, and the food is good; everything is good 
on the Memnon except the beverages and the cigars. 
The wine could be improved and the cigars could be 
thrown away. I paid a shilling for one that was as 
hard as a stick and crumbled to dust when I bit it. 
Never mind the flavor. That brand was called "The 
Scarab . " It should have been named ' ' The Mummy ' ' 
— it had all the characteristics. 

The pilot commands this boat — the captain merely 
conducts the excursion. The captain wears Euro- 
pean dress and speaks English, but the pilot is Arab 

361 



The Ship -Dwellers 



throughout — dark - faced, heavily turbaned, silent — 
watching the water like a sphinx. Now and then he 
makes a motion and says a word to the steersman 
at his side. Whenever we lie up or strike safe water 
he locates Mecca, prostrates himself, and prays. I 
should think his emotions would be conflicting at 
times. Doctrinally, of course, it is his duty to pray 
for the boat to sink and exterminate this crowd. 
Professionally, it is his duty to take us safely to 
Cairo. Poor old Abbas! how are you going to 
explain to the prophet by-and-by? 

We may not reach Cairo, however. The Nile is 
shallow at this season, and already we have scraped 
the sand more than once. It is a curious river — full 
of currents and shifting sand — the water getting 
scantier as you descend. That seemed strange to 
us until we realize that its entire flow comes from 
the far interior; that it has no feeding tributaries, 
while the steady evaporation, the irrigation, and the 
absorption of these burning sands constitute a heavy 
drain. It is hard to grasp a condition like that, or 
what this river means — has always meant — to the 
dwellers along its shores. Not alone an artery of 
life, it is life itself — water, food, clothing, cleanliness. 

They don't take as much advantage of that last 
blessing as they should — nor of the next to the last. 
It is true that most of them have some semblance of 
clothing, but not all of them. In this interior Nile, as 
we may call the district between Luxor and Cairo, early 
principles to some extent still prevail. At first we saw 
boys — donkey-boys and the like — without any per- 
ceivable clothing, and more lately we have seen men 

362 



The Highway of Egypt 



— brown-skinned muscular creatures loading boats — 
utterly destitute of wardrobe. Yet, somehow, these 
things did not shock us — not greatly. They seemed 
to go with the sun, and the dead blue sky and the 
other scenery. A good deal depends on surroundings. 

Our stops were not all brief. We put in a full day 
at Abydos, where there is a splendid temple built by 
Seti I., and Rameses the Great (of course), and where 
the donkeys are as poor as they are good in Luxor. 
Not that they were wretched in appearance, or ill- 
cared for, but they were a stiff-necked, unwilling 
breed. Mine had a way of stopping suddenly and 
facing about toward home. Twice I went over his head 
during these manoeuvres, which the others thought 
entertaining. 

But they had their troubles, too. The distance to 
the temple was long — eight miles, I should think — 
and part of the way the road was an embankment 
several feet high. Some of the donkeys seemed to 
think it amusing to suddenly decide to go down this 
embankment and make off over the desert. We were 
a scattering, disordered cavalcade, and what with the 
flies and distracting donkey-boys who were perpetually 
at one's side with "Mister, good donkey — fine donkey 
— baksheesh, mister," the trip was a memorable one. 
Once when my donkey, whose name was "Straight 
Flush" and should have been "Two-spot" got behind 
the party, I caught my attendant, not only twisting 
his tail, but biting it. 

It was a good excursion, on the whole. We had 
luncheon in the great hall of the temple, and I could 

363 



The Ship -Jewellers 



not help wondering who had held the first feast in 
that mighty place where we were holding the last, 
to date. 

We feel at home now in a temple, especially when 
we see the relief of our faithful Rameses, and of 
Osiris, king of the underworld, and his kind. We 
have become familiar and even disrespectful toward 
these great guardians of the past. This makes it hard 
on Gaddis at times ; especially after luncheon, when 
we are in a sportive mood. 

"Zis is ze temple of Rameses ze Great" — he begins. 

"Ah, so it is — we suspected it all along." 

"Here you will see hees seventy-two son — " 

"Sure enough — our old friends." 

"And hees fourteen wive." 

"Happy man, but why a king and so few?" 

"An' here all zose seventy-two son carry gift to 
Osiris — " 

"King of the underworld — so they do, we would 
recognize that gang anywhere." 

Truly, it is time we were giving up temples ; we are 
no longer serious. But in this temple of Seti I., at 
Abydos, we sometimes forgot to jest. Frivolous and 
riotous as we have become, we were silent in the 
presence of one splendid decoration of Seti offering 
sacrifice before the sacred boat, and again where we 
confronted in a corridor that precious and beautiful 
relief carving, the Tablet of Egypt's Kings. The 
cartouche of every king down to Seti I. is there — 
with one exception: the name of Amenophis IV., 
the king who abandoned his faith and worshipped 
his mother's gods, has no place in that royal company. 

3 6 4 



The Highway of Egypt 



Otherwise the story is as complete as it is impressive, 
and I recognized something of what that document 
means to those of Egypt who know (like Gaddis), 
when I put out a finger to touch the exquisite work 
and he whispered, "No, please." 

What record will there be of our history thirty-five 
centuries from now ? Not a book of all those printed 
to-day will last any considerable fraction of that 
period. A tablet like this sets one to wondering 
if we should not get an appropriation to preserve at 
least the skeleton of our chronology on plates of 
bronze to be stored in some deep vault safe from the 
ravages of fire and flood and earthquake. 

We also stopped at Assuit, or Asyut, or Suit — 
I like these Egyptian names — you can spell them 
any way you please. Every one of them has all the 
spellings you can think of; you could not invent a 
new one if you tried. It is at Assuit they make the 
spangled shawls, and the natives flock down to the 
boat-landing to sell them. Gaddis had probably tele- 
graphed ahead that a floating asylum of Americans 
was on the way and they had assembled accordingly. 
Long before we were in trading distance they began 
to dance about and gesticulate — the sheen of their 
fabrics blazing in the sun — crying the prices which 
they did not expect to get. 

Some of our ladies were quite eager, and began to 
make offers when we were still many yards from 
shore. I suppose they thought the supply was 
limited. By the time we touched the landing the 
wildest trading was already going on. Shawls rolled 
in a ball were being flung aboard for examination, 
24 365 



The Ship -Dwellers 



and flung back wildly with preposterous under-bids, 
only to come hurtling back again with a fierce protest 
of refusal. For a time it was a regular game of 
snowball and fireworks. There were canes to sell, 
too, and fly- whips — beautiful ivory-handled things. 
Commerce swelled to high tide. In the midst of the 
melee somebody happened to notice, what we had 
not seen before, another steamer lying a little way 
ahead — an English party, we were told — the ladies 
and gentlemen quietly reading or pityingly regarding 
our exhibition. I know, now, that the English have 
no sense of humor. Another American boat would 
have been in spasms of delight at our antics. Also, 
the Englishman's Egypt is not as ours, and he does 
not enjoy it as much. How could he, without loading 
up, as we did, with those wonderful Assuit shawls ? 

Only one more stop along the Nile will I record. 
This was at Tell al-Amarna, where, in the desert a 
little beyond the green, lies all that is left of the city 
built by the heretic king, Amenophis IV., who 
abandoned Amen-Ra for the sun-worship of his 
Mesopotamia mother, Queen Thi. 

It was a splendid granite city once, but it is all 
gone now. Only a little of the floor of the palace is 
left, Queen Thi's apartment, Gaddis said, but it held 
for us a curious interest. For it is painted, or per- 
haps enamelled, in colors, and the decorations, still 
in a good state of preservation, are not Egyp- 
tian in design, but Syrian or Persian! The Prin- 
cess who had left her land to marry an Egyptian 
king could not forsake her gods and her traditions, 
and that old floor remains to-day after thirty-five 

366 



The Highway of Egypt 



centuries to tell the story of her loyalty and her 
love. 

We should have made other stops, perhaps, but we 
met disaster. The Nile was low, as I have said, and 
a hundred miles below Cairo we awoke one morning 
to find our boat hard and fast aground. We had, in 
fact, grounded the evening before, and Abbas and his 
men had been working all night, putting out anchors 
and pulling on ropes, a picturesque group, to the 
chorus "Ali sah — ali ya seni — ali hoop!" which is 
an appeal to the god of the Nile, Gaddis said, in this 
case unavailing. We were there to stay for the 
summer, unless we took train to Cairo, so after 
breakfast Gaddis and I went ashore with Abra- 
ham, still semi-officially attached to our party, and 
walked three miles to the nearest railway station to 
see what might be done. It was a fine walk, even 
though a warm one, across the Egyptian fields, and I 
saw some papyrus plant and bought a distaff and spin- 
dle from a man who was sitting by the road spinning 
after the fashion of the earliest race of men. 

It was Fachen that we reached, an Arab town to 
which tourists never come, and the donkeys we ar- 
ranged for there, to carry our party from the shore 
landing to the station, were a nondescript lot without 
saddle or bridle — with no gear, in fact, except a rem- 
nant of rope tied around the neck. Then we walked 
back opposite the boat, another three miles, and 
sat on the bank, and sweat and waved our hands and 
called to those people, half a mile away in mid-stream, 
who for some reason could not see our signals. 

3 6 7 



The Ship -Dwellers 



It was not uninteresting, though. The natives came 
to inspect us — an unusual opportunity for them — 
and some women came down to the Nile with great 
stone jars for water. Those jars must hold eight or 
ten gallons, and are heavy enough empty, yet those 
women will balance them on their heads and go 
stepping away chatting lightly, indifferent to their 
great burdens. They were barefooted and wore 
anklets which I wanted to buy, but Gaddis did not 
seem interested, and I could not transact a delicate 
business like that without careful interpretation. 

Our people saw us at last and came for us in a 
boat. Then there was a bustle of preparation; a 
loading into the markab which we had engaged to 
take us ashore ; a good-bye to our pretty, unfortunate 
little Memnon; a drifting down to the donkey landing, 
and a sorry -looking procession to the railway. 

Our guides had difficulty settling with donkey-men, 
who, never having had tourists before, had engaged, 
no doubt, at their usual rates; then suddenly they 
had awakened to the idea that they were missing the 
chance of a fortune. The baksheesh we gave them 
must have opened their eyes. Probably they had 
never received so much at one time before. At all 
events, they came back for a new settlement, sur- 
rounded Gaddis and Abraham, and for a while we 
thought inferno had broken loose. Gaddis finally 
resorted to a stick, but Abraham, who is as big as a 
camel, first delivered an admonition, and then ran 
bodily upon the whole crowd and swept them like 
chaff from the platform. 

The wait at Fachen was not overlong, but it became 

368 



The Highway of Egypt 



a trifle tedious after the novelty of the place had 
passed. We telegraphed Cairo of our coming, and 
Abraham entertained us with a few marvels to while 
away the time. He said that the stone used in 
building the pyramids had been brought across the 
Nile; that such stone was light like pumice-stone 
when quarried; that it floated across, and that the 
water it soaked up solidified and turned it into hard, 
heavy stone on the other side. The Credulous One 
believed this statement. He said the Memnon had 
grounded on a reef of crocodiles, at this season asleep, 
tucked up in the bed of the Nile. The Credulous One 
believed that, too. Several of the party did. He 
said that all telegrams in Egypt are sent in English, 
for the reason that the Arabic characters get tangled 
up in the wires. I believed that myself. He would 
have enlightened us further, only the train came just 
then. 

We had to change at Wasta, where it was night, 
and I shall never forget that fevered scene of Arab 
faces and flaring lamps, and heat, and thirst — the 
one hot night in Egypt— as we wandered about that 
Egyptian station waiting for the Cairo express. 
Suddenly we came upon another party of our ship- 
dwellers, whose boat, ahead of ours, had grounded 
too. Finding them there in that weird place was all 
like something in a fever. Then we were on the 
express at last, roaring away through the dust and 
dark and heat to Cairo — a flight out of Egypt so 
modern that one could imagine the gates of the dead 
centuries behind us rushing together with a bang. 



XLIII 



OTHER WAYS THAT ARE EGYPTIAN 

THE Reprobates were at Shepheard's when we 
returned, enjoying Egypt thoroughly. Shep- 
heard's is a good place in which to enjoy Egypt. 
Some of the sights there are quite wonderful, and 
American refreshments are connected with an electric 
bell. 

The Reprobates had done Upper Egypt, however. 
They had done it in one day. They had left Cairo in 
the evening, telegraphing ahead for carriages to meet 
the train at Luxor, where they had arrived next 
morning. They had driven directly from the train to 
Karnak, from Karnak to the temple of Luxor, from 
Luxor to the hotel for luncheon. In the afternoon 
they had soared over to. the Valley of the Kings ; from 
the Kings they had dropped down on the House of 
Hatasu, the temples of Rameses and others ; they had 
come coursing back by the Colossi of Memnon in time 
to catch the Cairo express, which landed them at 
Shepheard's about daybreak. The Reprobates had 
enjoyed Upper Egypt very much, though I could see 
they regretted the necessity of devoting all that time 
to it when Shepheard's still remained partially 
unexplored. 

I had hardly landed in my room when a call-boy 
from the office came up to say that a police-officer was 

37o 



Other Ways That Are Egyptian 



below, asking for me. For a moment I wondered a 
little feverishly what particular thing it was he 
wanted me for. Then the boy said, ' ' Pyramid police, ' ' 
which brought a gleam of light. "Oh, why — yes, of 
course — show him up!" 

And now, while we are waiting for him, I am going 
to record a circumstance which I suppose a good many 
readers — especially those familiar with the East — 
may find it difficult to believe. Nevertheless, it is 
authentic and provable. 

In Egypt, baksheesh is a national institution. 
Everybody takes it — every Egyptian, I mean; if I 
should begin by saying I had met an exception to this 
rule I could not expect any one who knows Cairo to 
read any further. This by-the-way. 

It was during our first stop in Cairo, and we had 
been there a day or two before we made our official 
visit to the Pyramids and Sphinx. We went in 
carriages then, attended by two guides. For some 
reason, however, our protectors left us to shift pretty 
much for ourselves when we got there, and it was 
a pretty poor shift. The fortune-tellers and scarab- 
sellers and donkey-men and would-be guides swarmed 
about us and overran us and would not be ap- 
peased. When we repulsed them temporarily they 
rallied and broke over us in waves, and swept us here 
and there, until we became mere human flotsam and 
jetsam on that tossing Egyptian tide. 

It was all like a curiously confused dream. Members 
of our party would suddenly turn up, and as suddenly 
disappear again : there would be moments of lull when 
we seemed about to collect, then, presto! without any 

37 1 



The Ship -Dwellers 



apparent cause there would occur wild confusion and 
despair. 

It was no use. Laura and I wanted to go inside the 
Great Pyramid, and we did not want to climb it. It 
was impossible to do one, and it was about equally 
impossible not to do the other. Out of the confusion 
of things at last I remembered a young officer of the 
police, whom I had met riding home that first night 
on the trolley — a mere lad of nineteen or twenty, but 
a big fellow, who spoke excellent English and said he 
was Superintendent of the Pyramid Police. I decided 
now to see if this was true, and, if so, to ask his advice 
in our present difficulties. 

I remembered that the police station was near the 
trolley terminus, and we gradually fought our way 
back there. Yes, there he was, at his desk, a hand- 
some soldierly figure in a tall red fez. He rose and 
bowed, remembering us immediately. 

We would like to look about a little, I said, and to 
go inside the big Pyramid, but we preferred to be alive 
when we got through ; also fairly decent as to appear- 
ance. Couldn't he pick us out a guard or two, who 
would keep the enemy in check, and see us through ? 

He bowed with easy grace. 

"I will ac-company you myself," he said. 

Now, I already knew the custom of Egypt, and I 
began to make a hasty estimate of my ready money, 
wondering if I had sufficient for a baksheesh of this 
rank. It was by no" means certain. However, there 
would be ship-dwellers about : I could borrow, perhaps. 

I decided presently that whatever the duty imposed, 
it was worth it. With that big uniformed fellow 

37 2 



Other Ways That Are Egyptian 



at our side we were immune to all that hungry horde 
of Arab vultures. We walked through unscathed. 
Our protector procured the entrance tickets for us; 
he selected two strong men to push and pull us up the 
long, dark, glassy-slick passage that leads to the 
sepulchre of Khufu in the very heart of the Pyramid ; 
he went with us himself into that still mysterious 
place, explaining in perfect English how five or six 
thousand years ago the sarcophagus of the great king 
was pushed up that incline ; he showed us the mortises 
in the stone where uprights were set to hold the great 
granite coffin when the laborers stopped to rest. It 
was a weird experience in the cool, quiet darkness of 
that mightiest of tombs with the flaring candles and 
eager sure-footed Arabs; it seemed to belong in 
Rider Haggard's story of She. Then, after we had 
seen the old black sarcophagus, which is empty now, 
and had remained a little in that removed place, 
trying to imagine that we were really in the very 
centre of the big Pyramid, we made our way out 
again to light and the burning desert heat. I settled 
with our Arabs with little or no difficulty, which is 
worth something in itself, and when we had found a 
quiet place I thanked our guardian and tendered 
him what I thought a liberal honorarium — fairly 
liberal, even for America. 

He drew back a little. 

"Oh no," he said, "I beg your pardon." 

I had not made it large enough then. I glanced 
about for some of the party who would have funds. 

"I am sorry," I began, "it is not more. I will — " 

"I beg your pardon," he repeated, "but I could 

373 



The Ship -Dwellers 



not accept anything for what is but my duty. I am 
only very glad to do what I may for you. I will do 
something more, if you wish." 

Then, of course, I knew it must be a dream, and that 
I would wake up presently in Shepheard's Hotel to 
find that we hadn't started for the Pyramids yet. 
Still, I would keep up the blessed trance a moment 
longer. 

' ' You mean that you will not allow me to acknowl- 
edge your great favor to us?" I said in that polite 
manner for which our ship is justly famous. 

' ' Not in money, ' ' he said. ' ' The Government pays 
me a salary for my work and this is only part of my 
work. It has also given me pleasure." 

I surreptitiously pinched myself in certain tender 
places to see if I couldn't wake up. It was no use. 
He persisted in his refusal, and presently produced an 
ancient corroded coin, Greek or Roman, such as is 
sometimes found among the debris. 

' ' I should like to offer you this, ' ' he said. ' ' I found 
it myself, so I am sure it is genuine." 

Ah, this was the delicate opportunity. 

"You will let me buy it, of course." 

But no, he declined that, too. He wished us only 
to remember him, he insisted. He added: 

"I have two scarabs at home; I should like to 
bring them to your hotel." 

It was rather dazing. The seller of scarabs — 
genuine or imitation — will not let a prospective pur- 
chaser get out of sight. I wondered why we should 
be trusted in this unheard-of way; I also wondered 
what those two scarabs were likely to be worth. 

374 



Other Ways That Are Egyptian 



Could he come to-night? I asked; we should be 
sight-seeing to-morrow and leaving for Upper Egypt 
in the afternoon. 

But no, he would not be home in time. He would 
wait until we returned from Upper Egypt. 

So it was we had parted, and in the tumult of sight- 
seeing up the Nile I had forgotten the matter alto- 
gether. Now, here he was. I counted up my spare 
currency, and waited. 

He had on his best smile as he entered, also a brand- 
new uniform, and he certainly made a handsome figure. 
He inquired as to our sight-seeing up the Nile, then 
rather timidly he produced two of those little Egyp- 
tian gems — a scarab and an amulet, such as men and 
women of old Egypt wore, and took with them to 
their tombs. 

"I got them from a man who took them from a 
mummy. They are genuine. I want to give them 
to you and the little la-dy," he said. 

"But you must not give them to us — they are too 
valuable," I began. 

He flushed and straightened up a little. 

"But that is why I wish you to have them." 

Now, of course, no one who knows Cairo can ever 
believe that story. Yet it all truly happened, pre- 
cisely as I have set it down. He was just a young 
Egyptian who had attended school in Alexandria, and 
he spoke and wrote English, French, Italian, and the 
dialects of Arabic. The Egyptian acquires the lore 
of languages naturally, it would seem, but that this 
youth should acquire all those things, and such a 

375 



The Ship -Dwellers 



standard of honor and generosity, here in a land 
where baksheesh is the native god, did seem amazing. 
When we left, he wrote down our address in the 
neatest possible hand, requesting permission to send 
us something more. 

Note. — As my reputation for truth is already gone I may as 
well add, a year later, that he has since sent two presents — some 
little funerary figures, and a beautiful ivory^handled fly-whip. 



XLIV 



SAKKARA AND THE SACRED BULLS 

ONE begins and finishes Egypt with Cairo. 
Starting with the Sphinx and Pyramids of the 
Fourth Dynasty, you work down through the Theban 
periods of the Upper Nile and then once more at 
Cairo, leap far back into the First period in a trip to 
Memphis, the earliest capital of Egypt, the beginning 
of all Egyptian things. After which, follows the 
Museum, for only after visiting localities and land- 
marks can that great climax be properly approached. 

I think we were no longer very enthusiastic about 
ruins, but every one said we must go to Sakkara. 
There was yet another very wonderful statue of 
Rameses there, they said, also the oldest pyramids 
ever built, and the Mausoleum of the Sacred Bulls. 
It would never do to miss them. 

I am glad now that I did not miss them, but I 
remember the Memphis donkeys with unkindness. 
The farther down the Nile the worse the donkeys. 
We thought they had been bad at Abydos, but the 
Abydos donkeys were without sin compared with 
those of Sakkara. Mine was named "Sunrise," and I 
picked him for his beauty, always a dangerous asset. 
He was thoroughly depraved and had a gait like a 
steam-drill. The boat landed us at Bedrashen and I 
managed to survive as far as the colossal statue of 

377 



The Ship -Dwellers 



Rameses, a prostrate marvel, and the site of the 
ancient city of Menes — capital of Egypt a good deal 
more than six thousand years ago — that is, before the 
world began, by gospel calculation. I was perfectly 
willing to stay there among the cooling palms and 
watch the little children gather camel-dung and pat 
it into cakes to dry for fuel, and I would have done it 
if I had known what was going to happen to me. 

It is a weary way across the desert to the pyramids 
and the tombs of those sacred bulls, but I was not 
informed of that. When I realized, it was too late. 
The rest of the party were far ahead of me beyond 
some hills, and I was alone in the desert with that 
long-eared disaster and a donkey-boy who stopped 
to talk with the children, beset by a plague of flies 
that would have brought Pharaoh to terms. It was 
useless to kick and hammer that donkey or to denounce 
the donkey-boy. Sunrise had long ago formulated 
his notions of speed, and the donkey-boy was simply 
a criminal in disguise. When we passed a mud vil- 
lage, at last, and a new brigade of flies joined those 
I had with me, I would have given any reasonable 
sum to have been at Cairo with the Reprobates, in 
the cool quiet of Shepheard's marble halls. 

Beyond the village was just the sand waste, and not 
a soul of the party in sight. I didn't have the courage 
to go back, and hardly the courage to go on. I said I 
would lie down by the trail and die, and let them find 
me there and be sorry they had forsaken me in that 
pitiless way. Then for the sake of speed I got off 
and walked. It was heavy walking through the loose 
sand, with the sun blazing down. 

378 



Sakkara and the Sacred Bulls 



Presently I looked around for my escort. He was 
close at my heels — on the donkey's back. I said the 
most crushing things I could think of and displaced 
him. Then we settled down into the speed of a ram- 
headed sphinx again. Everything seemed utterly 
hopeless. It was useless to swear; I was too old to 
cry. 

I don't know when we reached the first pyramid, 
but the party had been there and gone. I did not 
care for it much. It might be the oldest pyramid in 
the world, but it was rather a poor specimen, I 
thought, and could not make me forget my sorrow. 
I went on, and after a weary time came to the Tomb 
of Thi, who lived in the Fifth Dynasty and was in no 
way related to Queen Thi of Tell al-Amarna, who 
came along some two thousand years later. There 
was an Englishman and his guide there who told me 
about it, and it was worth seeing, certainly, with its 
relief frescoes over five thousand years old, though it 
is not such a tomb as those of the Upper Nile. 

I overtook the party at the Tomb of the Sacred 
Bulls. By that time I had little enthusiasm for bulls; 
or for tombs, unless it was one I could use for Sunrise. 
The party had done the bulls, but when I got hold of 
Gaddis and laid my case before him, he said he would 
find me a new donkey and that the others would 
wait while we inspected the bulls. So everything 
was better then, and I was glad of the bulls, though 
I was still warm and resentful at Sunrise and his 
keeper, and even at Gaddis, who was innocent enough, 
Heaven knows. 

In the tomb of the bulls everything unpleasant 

379 



The Ship -Dwellers 



passed away. It was cool and dark in there, and we 
carried lights and wandered along those vast still 
corridors, which are simply astounding when one 
remembers their purpose. 

This Serapeum or Apis mausoleum is a vast suc- 
cession of huge underground vaults and elaborate 
granite sarcophagi, which once contained all the Apis 
or Sacred Bulls of Memphis. The Apis was the prod- 
uct of an immaculate conception. Lightning de- 
scended from heaven upon a cow — any cow — and the 
Apis was the result. He was recognized by being 
black, with a triangular spot of white on his forehead 
and a figure of an eagle on his back. Furthermore, he 
had double hairs in his tail and a beetle on his tongue. 
It was recognized that only lightning could produce 
a bull like that, and no others were genuine, regardless 
of watchful circumstance. 

Apis was about the most sacred of the whole synod 
of Egyptian beasts. Even the Hawk of Horus and 
the Jackal of Anubis had to retire to obscurity when 
Apis came along, mumbling and pawing up the dust. 
When he died there were very solemn ceremonies, and 
he was put into one of those polished granite sar- 
cophagi, with a tablet on the walls relating the story 
of his life, and mentioning the King whose reign had 
been honored by this bellowing bovine aristocrat. 
Also they set up a special chapel over his tomb, and 
this series of chapels and tombs eventually solidified 
into a great temple with pylons approached by an 
avenue of sphinxes. 

The Serapeum dates from about 1500 b.c. and con- 
tinued in active use down to the time of the Ptolomies. 

380 



Sakkara and the Sacred Bulls 



The Egyptian Pantheon was breaking up then, and 
Apis was probably one of the first deities to go. A 
nation's gods fall into disrepute when they can no 
longer bring victory to a nation's arms, and a sacred 
bull who could not beat off Julius Caesar would very 
likely be asked to resign. 

There are sixty-four vaults in the part of the Serap- 
eum we visited, and twenty-four of them contain the 
granite sarcophagi. The sarcophagi are about thirteen 
feet long by eleven feet wide, and eight high — that is 
to say, the size of an ordinary bedroom — and in each 
of these, mummified and in state, an Apis slept. 

He is not there now. Only two of him were found 
when these galleries were opened in modem times. 
But I have seen Apis, for one of him sleeps now in a 
glass case in the Historical Library in New York 
City. I shall visit him again on my return, and view 
him with deeper interest and more respect since I 
have seen his tomb. 

25 



XLV 



A VISIT WITH RAMESES II. 

I HAVE never quite known just how it was I hap- 
pened to be overlooked and deserted that next 
evening at the Museum. I remember walking miles 
through its wonderful galleries; I recollect standing 
before the rare group of Rameses and his queen — 
recently discovered and put in place — the most beauti- 
ful sculpture in Egypt; I recall that we visited the 
room of Mr. Theodore Davis and looked on all the 
curiously modern chairs and couches and the per- 
fectly preserved chariot taken from the tombs opened 
in the Valley of the Kings ; also the room where all 
the royal jewels are kept, marvellous necklaces and 
amulets, and every ornament that would delight a 
king or queen in any age ; I have a confused impression 
of hundreds of bronze and thousands of clay figures 
taken from tombs; I know that, as a grand climax, 
we came at last to the gem of the vast collection, the 
room where Seti I., Rameses the Great, and the 
rest of the royal dead, found at Der al-Bahari, lie 
asleep. I remember, too, that I was tired then, 
monumentally tired in the thought that this was the 
last word in Egypt; that we were done; that there 
was no need of keeping up and alive for further en- 
deavor — that only before us lay the sweet anticipation 
of rest. 

382 



A Visit With Rameses II. 



The others were tired, too, but they wanted to buy 
some things in the little salesroom down-stairs, and 
were going, presently. They would come back and 
see the kings again, later. I said I would stay there 
and commune a little alone with the great Seti, and his 
royal son, who, in that dim long ago, had remembered 
himself so numerously along the Nile. They meant 
to come back, no doubt, the party, I mean ; they claim 
now that the main museum was already closed when 
they had finished their purchases, and they supposed 
I had gone. It does not matter, I have forgiven them, 
whatever their sin. 

It was pleasant and restful there, when they had 
left me. I dropped down on a little seat against the 
wall and looked at those still figures, father and son, 
kings, mighty warriors and temple-builders when the 
glory of Egypt was at full flood. 

It was an impressive thought that those stately 
temples up the Nile, which men travel across the world 
to see, were built by these two ; that the statues are 
their statues ; that the battles and sacrifices depicted 
on a thousand walls were their battles and their sacri- 
fices; that they loved and fought and conquered, 
and set up monuments in those far-off centuries when 
history was in its sunrise, yet lie here before us in 
pe son to-day, frail drift on the long tide of years. 

And it was a solemn thought that their life story 
is forever done — that any life story can last but a 
little while. Tossed up out of the unexplored, one's 
feet some day touch the earth — the ancient earth that 
had been going on so long before we came. Then, for 
a few years, we bustle importantly up and down — 

383 



The Ship -Dwellers 



fight battles and build temples, maybe — and all at 
once slip back into the uncharted waste, while the 
world — the ancient world — fights new battles, builds 
new temples, sends new ships across the sea, though 
we have part in it no more, no more — forever, and 
forever. 

Looking at those two, who in their brief sojourn 
had made and recorded some of the most ancient 
history we know, I recalled portions of their pictured 
story on the temple walls and tried to build a human 
semblance of their daily lives. Of course they were 
never troubled with petty things, I thought; econ- 
omies, frivolities, small vanities, domestic irritations 
— these were modern. They had been as gods in 
the full panoply of a race divinely new. They had 
been — 

But it was too much of an effort. I was too worn. 
I could only look at them, and envy the long nap 
they were having there under the glass in that still, 
pleasant room. 

I was a good deal surprised, then, when I fancied I 
saw Rameses stir and appear a little restless in his 
sleep. It was even more interesting to see him pres- 
ently slide away the glass and sit up. I thought there 
must be some mistake, and I was going to get an 
attendant, when he noticed me and seemed to guess 
my thought. 

"It's all right," he said, "you needn't call any one. 
The place closed an hour ago and there is only a guard 
down-stairs, who is asleep by this time. It happens 
to be my night to reincarnate and I am glad you are 
here to keep me company. You can tell me a good 

384 



A Visit With Rameses II. 



deal, no doubt. These people here don't know any- 
thing." He waved a hand to the sleepers about him. 
' 'They are allowed only one night in a thousand 
years. The gods allow me a night in every century. 
I was always a favorite of the gods. It is fortunate 
you happened to stop with us to-night." 

"It is fortunate," I said. "I shall be envied by 
my race. I have just been trying to imagine some- 
thing of your life and period. That is far more in- 
teresting than to-day. Tell me something about it." 

Rameses rested comfortably on the side of his case. 

"Oh, well," he said, reflectively, "of course mine 
was a great period — a very great period. Egypt was 
never so great as it was under my rule. It was my 
rule that made it great — my policy, of course, and 
my vigorous action. I was always for progress 
and war. The histories you have of my period are poor 
things. They never did me justice, but it was my 
own fault, of course. I did not leave enough records 
of my work. I was always a modest man — too modest 
for my own good, everybody said that. 

"I was religious, too, and built temples wherever 
there was room. It is said that I claimed temples 
that I did not build. Nonsense! — I built all the 
temples. I built Karnak; I built Luxor; I built 
Abou-Simbel ; I built Abydos ; I built the Pyramids ; 
I built the Sphinx ; I invented the sacred bulls ; I was 
all there was to religion, in Egypt. I was all there 
was to Egypt. I was the whole thing. It is a pity 
I did not make a record of these things somewhere." 

"There are a few statues of you," I suggested, "and 
inscriptions — they seem to imply — «" 

385 



The Ship -Dwellers 



"Ah yes," he said, "but not many. It was slow 
work carving those things. I could have had many 
more, if the workmen had been more industrious. 
But everything was slow, and very costly — very 
costly indeed — why, I spent a fortune on that temple 
of Karnak alone. You saw what I did there; those 
ram-headed sphinxes nearly bankrupted me. I had 
to cut down household expenses to finish them. 

"Yes, my wife objected a good deal — I speak 
collectively, of course, signifying my domestic com- 
panionship — there were fourteen of her. 

"She wanted jewelry — collectively — individually, 
too, for that matter — and it took such a lot to go 
around. You saw all those things in the next room. 
They were for her; they were for that matrimonial 
collection; I could never satisfy the female craving 
for such things. Why, I bought one round of neck- 
laces that cost as much as a ram-headed sphinx. 
Still she was not satisfied. Then she was sorry after- 
ward — collectively — and bought me a sphinx as a 
present — got it made cheap somewhere with her 
picture carved on the front of it. You may have 
noticed it — third on the right as you come out. I 
used it — I had to — but it was a joke. When wives 
buy things for their husbands it is quite often so. 

"Oh yes, I was a great king, of course, and the 
greatest warrior the world has ever seen; but my 
path was not all roses. My wife — my household 
collection — wanted their statues placed by the side 
of mine. Individually! Think of what a figure I 
would have cut! It was a silly notion. What had 
they done to deserve statues? I did it, though — 

386 



GOT IT MADE CHEAP SOMEWHERE, WITH HER PICTURE 
CARVED ON THE FRONT OF IT 



A Visit With Rameses II. 



that is collectively — here and there. I embodied her 
in a single figure at my knee, as became her position. 
But she wasn't satisfied — collectively and individually 
she declared she amounted to as much as I did, and 
pointed at our seventy-two sons. 

" No, I was never understood by that lot. I was 
never a hero in my own house. So I had to order 
another statue, putting her at my side. You saw it 
down-stairs. It is very beautiful, of course, and is a 
good likeness of her, collectively. She always made 
a good composite picture, but is it fair to me? She 
was never regarded in that important way, except by 
herself. 

"Yes, it is very pleasant here — very indeed. The 
last time I was allowed to reincarnate, I was still in 
the cave at Der al-Bahari, where they stored us when 
Cambyses came along and raided Thebes. Cambyses 
burned a number of my temples. It was too bad. 
The cave was a poor place, but safe. My tomb was 
much pleasanter, though it was not as grand as I had 
intended it to be. I meant to have the finest tomb 
in the valley, but my contractor cheated me. 

"The men who furnished the materials paid him 
large sums and gave me very poor returns. His 
name was Baksheesh, which is how the word orig- 
inated, though it means several things now, I be- 
lieve." 

"How interesting!" I interrupted. "We would 
call that grafting in our country." 

"Very likely ; I didn't find out that he was grafting, 
as you say, until quite late, then I put him into a 
block of concrete and built him into a temple. He 

387 



The Ship -Dwellers 



made a very good block; he is there yet. After that 
there was no trouble for a while." 

' ' I saw something of the kind at Algiers — one 
Geronimo," I began — 

"Later, three thousand years later. I originated 
the idea — it has been often adopted since. Those 
people along the Coast adopted a good many of my 
ideas, but they never get the value out of them. It 
put an end to baksheesh — graft as you call it — in 
Thebes, and it would be valuable to-day in Cairo, I 
should think. A wall around Cairo could be built 
in that way — there is enough material.' ' 

The King rested a little on his other arm, then 
continued : 

"Speaking of my tomb. I am glad I am not there. 
I attract much more attention here than if I were on 
exhibition in that remote place. There's Amenophis 
II. I understand that he's very proud of the fact 
that he's the only king left in his tomb. I don't envy 
him at all. I have a hundred visitors where he has 
one. They are passing by me here in a string all 
day, and when they are your countrymen I can hear 
a good deal even through the thick glass. I find it 
more interesting to stay here in my case through the 
day, than to be stalking about the underworld, 
attending sacrifices to Anubis and those other gods. 
I was always fond of activity and progress." 

"You keep up with your doings, then?" 

"Well, not altogether. You see, I cannot go about 
in the upper world. I catch only a word of things 
from the tourists. I hear they have a new kind of 
boat on the Nile." 

388 



A Visit With Rameses II. 



"Yes, indeed," I said. "A boat that is run by 
steam — a mixture of fire and water — and is lit by 
electricity — a form of lightning." 

I thought he would be excited over these things, and 
full of questions; but he only reflected a little and 
asked, 

"What is the name of that boat?" 
"Oh, there are many of them. The one I came 
down on was called the Memnon. 11 
He sighed. 

"There it is," he said, sadly. "Iam discredited, 
you see. I suppose they couldn't name it 'Rameses 
the Great.' " 

"Ah, but there is one of that name, too." 

He brightened a little, but grew sad again. 

"Only one?" he said. 

' ' Do you think there should be more of that name ?" 
I asked. 

He sat up quite straight. 

"In my time they would all have borne that great 
name," he said. 

"And — ah, wouldn't that be a bit confusing?" 

"Not at all. I have set up as many as a hundred 
statues in one temple — all of Rameses the Great. 
They were not at all confusing. You knew all of 
them immediately." 

"True enough; and now I think of it, perhaps you 
have not heard that they have made your portrait 
as you lie here, and, by a magic process of ours, have 
placed it on a sort of papyrus tablet — a postal card 
we call it — and by another process have sent thou- 
sands of them over the world." 

389 



The Ship -Dwellers 



He looked at me with eyes that penetrated my 
conscience. 

"Is that statement true?" he asked, tremulously. 

"It is — every word. Your portrait is as familiar 
to the world to-day as it was here in Egypt three 
thousand years ago." 

The great peace that had rested on the king's 
face came back to it. The piercing eyes closed rest- 
fully, and he slipped back on his pillow. 

"Then, after all, I am vindicated," he murmured. 
"I have not lived and died in vain." 

A hand was resting on my shoulder. The sun was 
shining in, and a threatening guard was standing 
over me. 

It was nothing. Five francs allayed his indignation. 
Five francs is a large baksheesh in Cairo, but I did not 
begrudge it, as matters stood. 



XLVI 



THE LONG WAY HOME 

WE bade good-bye to Egypt that morning, and to 
Gaddis — whose name and memory will always 
mean Egypt to me — and were off for Alexandria, 
where the ship was waiting. That long-ago dream of 
a visit to Damascus and Jerusalem, and of a camp on 
the Nile had been realized. Now it was over. 

We were ready to go home — at least some of us 
were. There would be a stop at Naples, with Pompeii 
and Rome for those who cared for it, but even these 
great places would be tame after Egypt. They 
must be approached from another direction for that 
eager interest which properly belongs to an expedi- 
tion of this kind. A number of our ship-dwellers 
had an eager interest — a large and growing interest — 
but it was for home, an interest that was multiplied 
each day by the square of the distance travelled. 

Not many of us were left when we had made our last 
touch on the Riviera, rounded the Rock, and set out on 
the long, steady, Atlantic swing. The Reprobates had 
gone vid Monte Carlo to Paris. Others had drifted 
up through Europe to sail from Cherbourg. The 
Diplomat was still with us ; also Fosdick of Ohio, and 
Laura, age fourteen, but only a score or two of the 
original muster could gather at the long table in the 
dining-room on the last night out of port, for a final 

39i 



The Ship -Dwellers 



look at one another, and to exchange the greetings and 
god-speeds for which there would be little time during 
the bustle of arrival. It was hardly an 'occasion; 
just a pleasant little meeting that even with jollifica- 




SET OUT ON THE LONG, STEADY, ATLANTIC SWING 



tion was not without sadness. One of the ship's 
poets offered some verses of good-bye, of which I 
recall these lines : 

" To-night, we are here who have stayed by the ship; 
To-morrow, the harbor and anchor and slip — 
The word of command for the gang-plank to fall — 
The word that shall suddenly scatter us all— 

39? 



The Long Way Home 



Then all the King's horses and all the King's men 
Could never collect us together again." 

That was a good while ago, nearly a year now, and 
already it seems as far back in the past as the days of 
Rameses; for, as I have said somewhere before, we 
have but a meagre conception of time. Indeed, I 
suspect there is no such thing as time. How can there 
be when one period is as long as another compared 
with eternity ? 

However, I do not compare with eternity, now. 
I compare with Egypt. I shall always compare with 
Egypt — everything else in the world. Other interests 
and other memories may fade and change, but Egypt, 
the real Egypt, the enchantment of that land, which 
is not a land, but a vast processional epic, will never 
change, and it will not grow dim. I may never visit 
it again, but I shall see it many times. I shall see the 
sunrise above the palms, flooding the mountains 
with amethyst and turning the sky to crimson gold. 
Again at sunset I shall sit in the vast temple of Luxor 
and hear once more the Muezzin's call to prayer. I 
shall race with Laura across the hot desert; I shall 
hear the cry of the donkey-boys and the scarab- 
sellers and the wail for baksheesh; I shall see our 
cavalcade scattering through the dust across the 
Libyan sands. And I shall wander once more among 
the tombs of the kings, and follow down the splendid 
passage where Amenophis lies with the repose of the 
ages on his benignant face. I shall recall other lands 
and other ages, too, but it is to Egypt that I shall 
turn after all the others have drifted by; to her 

393 



The Ship-Dwellers 

temples and her tombs — her glories of the past made 
visible. Beyond the sands and the centuries they 
lie, but they are mine now, and neither thief nor 
beggar, nor importunate creditor, can ever take them 
away. 



THE END 



